Advance of our products on Latinconnect
At the moment we continue to work diligently on updating the prices and descriptions of our product range on Latinconnect and adding individual products, such as missing transfers or domestic excursions. Our additional booking trips with the new dates for 2024 as well as some modules and packages are also already online.
A large proportion of the prices for individual services (hotels, transfers, domestic flights, excursions) can already be found with current prices on Latinconnect. Our building blocks and packages will be gradually updated throughout December. There are also some exciting new products, such as high-quality inland hotels and new excursions, that we are currently working on and would like to feature in our newsletters.
Review and current situation in Panama
In recent weeks, tours in Panama have been severely affected by protests. The reason for this was a law passed on October 20th to extend and expand mining concessions to the Canadian company First Quantum Minerals. The rejection of this law by a broad majority of society then led to nationwide protests and demonstrations. In order to build up further pressure, road blockades were set up, especially along the Pan-American Highway and inland, which significantly restricted mobility and supplies (fruits, vegetables, gasoline, gas) in various regions of Panama.
Our main task in the last few weeks has been to get as complete a picture as possible of the day-to-day situation. Demonstrations in Panama are not registered and road blockades are set up at short notice. But we were well informed thanks to our drivers and tour guides in Germany and, above all, social media.
During this time, we checked all programs and routes for our shared guests on site daily and, if necessary, changed them at short notice in consultation with the customers. Of course, we covered any additional costs incurred. However, it was often enough to adjust the transfer times or, in the case of rental car trips, to set off early to the next location or to provide information on how to avoid the roadblock.
On November 28th - also an important holiday in Panama (independence from Spain) - the country's Supreme Court (Corte Surprema) announced its verdict on various lawsuits against the law passed by Parliament and signed by the President. The law was declared unconstitutional and is therefore no longer valid. After another law was passed in advance due to pressure from the people and the protests, which prohibits future awarding of mining concessions, the verdict de facto means the end of industrial mineral mining in Panama.
With a view to the future and Panama's position as a sustainable travel destination, this is certainly good news for us. The topic of ecology and sustainability has received a lot of attention in the last few weeks and will also be an important topic in the upcoming 2024 election campaign.
After the verdict, the situation has now relaxed and normalized. The majority of the roadblocks were immediately cleared. All tourist activities are possible again without restrictions. There are still a few groups domestically that continue to set up barriers and counter-protests by miners or other groups directly affected by the mine closure. But these are selective and shorter demonstrations. We are of course continuing to monitor the situation closely. At the moment there is above all great joy and satisfaction among the population.
André Goatham and Nicolas Frühling look forward to meeting you soon at ITB 2024!
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