Bogota received 415,000 foreign visitors in the first half of 2011 which represents a 19% increase on the same period in 2010, according to figures from the Observatory of the District Tourism Institute and intelligence agency DAS, reported Radio Santa Fe.
Visitors to the city came for the purposes of tourism and business and represent 54% of all overseas tourists to Colombia. The second most popular city was Cartagena with 94,000 foreign visitors and Medellin with 72,000 foreign visitors.
The report states the 19.5% of visitors to Bogota come from the U.S., 12.5% are Venezuelan and 8.2% come from Brazil. Nohora Vargas, director of District Institute of Tourism said the institute is carrying out a study to market tourism in Bogota and promote the city as a tourist destination in the medium term.
The study concluded that priority markets should be countries and cities within 3 hours of Bogota by air and with direct air connections to the city. “In this case, the countries singled out for promotional activities were Peru, Ecuador and Venezuela,” said Vargas.