Every country would love to increase its flow of visitors. Some spend a fortune on quirky advertising campaigns, often with mixed success as Australia knows to its cost, but the route taken by Mexico is quite extraordinary.
In the last five years, over 50,000 people have been killed in drug-related violence in Mexico. This number is greater than in many civil wars – and the battle against the drug cartels is frequently referred to as a “war” by the Mexican government.
You would not visit a country in the midst of a bloody civil war, would you?
No one is going to Iraq, Libya or Syria for their holidays but it seems people are more than happy to visit Mexico. Every year since the war on drugs started, tourist numbers have increased and they are set to reach an all-time record this year.
What is even more surprising is that a large proportion of visitors are Americans who are probably the most risk-averse travellers imaginable. At the moment, the US State Department warns against “all but essential” travel to over half of Mexico’s 31 states. They even give specific advice about some tourist resorts – notably Acapulco where tourists are warned against straying more than a couple of blocks from the promenade at night.
Yet still they keep coming in droves to the “safe” resorts of Cancun, and the southern Pacific coast.
You have to wonder what will happen to Mexico’s tourist business if they ever win the war against drugs.