ORANJESTAD – The Minister of Tourism Dangui Oduber and the Director of the Aruba Ports Authority Marc Figaroa announced the dredging project that will initiate in the same week.
Dredging is the excavation of material from the bottom of the ocean to improve existing water features such as navigability at the port.
It is essential for the Cruise tourism of Aruba as this will make it possible to accommodate mega cruise ships at the port. One of the Mega Cruise ships is the Royal Caribbean Cruise line “Oasis Class”, which will bring thousands of visitors to Aruba.
The 1.6 million florin investment will take two weeks from start to finish, and they are estimated to dredge around 20 thousand metric cubes of sand and dirt from the bottom of the canal.
This is a joint effort of a local group of Varadero and a Canadian company named Ocean Group. The dredging will be carried out with due observance of the agreements with the Department of Nature and Environment (DNM); making sure the environment is not affected.
Cruise tourism is one of the most affected sectors by the pandemic, and it wasn’t until June 2021 that Aruba welcomed the first cruise ship after the lockdown. Cruise tourism has seen a slow start but is gradually improving. By 2021, Aruba welcomed 136 thousand cruise visitors in 96 calls, a 16% recovery compared to 2019, in which we received 830 thousand cruise visitors.
The forecast for 2022 is around 500 thousand visitors, representing a 60% recovery compared to 2019. This forecast has been somewhat affected due to the Omicron variant that caused many cancellations in the first three weeks of January 2022.
According to the Minister, the Aruba Ports Authority will continue investing in the upgrade of cruise tourism.