The Belize tourism Industry Association-BTIA today launched drive towards the annual Belize Tourism Expo when hundreds of international travel agents and writers converge on Belize to find out about its tourist attraction.
Steve Shultie, president of the Belize Tourism Industry Association told us that BETEX is about selling the Belize tourism product.
Steve Schulte, President BTIA
"We are announcing the launching of BETEZ 2004 which is a show to bring travel agents to Belize to expose them to our product, our resorts, our country."
"Travel agents are solicited to go to a number of shows around the world and we want to give them time to plan to come to Belize. These people go to multiple shows in the year and they need time to put this in their schedule. It also takes a great deal of background work to get people, put the show together, do the tours. These people will not only be coming to Belize City, they will be going to all of the destinations Cayo, Punta Gorda, and San Pedro so all of these arrangements have to be made in advance."
"This is really how the whole tourism industry got started in Belize so this is a very very important source of bringing tourists to Belize."
Planned to coincide with the September celebrations, BETEX will run from September 14 to 20.
7NEWS produced for broadcast by News Director Jules Vasquez
Edited for the internet by Keith Swift