Nowadays tourism in Nicaragua represents the second largest industry in the nation, tourists from all over the world are interested in exploring the diverse options it offer, from ecotourism to surf camps or luxury beach resorts, the country offers a wide option of entertainment to satisfy the market needs, however still more work to be done to potentiate Nicaragua as a travel hotspot and having a more competitive industry.
It is true that the tourism has continued growing over the past five years and is expected to continue growing even more with the construction of an interoceanic canal that will connect the Caribbean Sea with the Pacific Ocean, yet the tourism industry is not completely prepared to deal with an increment on demand and take advantages of the opportunities that the canal will bring. Not only bad managing practices or inefficient marketing strategies from both private and public sector threaten the growth of the tourism but the poor infrastructure and lack of knowledge on ICT.
Through detailed analysis about the current situation of tourism in Nicaragua, this document will serve as an instrument to provide a general overview of the tourism industry to identify effective strategies and mechanism that foster the growth of the touristic sector of Nicaragua.
This paper will focus on the factors that have an impact on the competitiveness of the tourism industry of Nicaragua; at the same time, it examine successful cases from Central America that can help obtain insights on how an industry can be more competitive.
Striving for competing in bigger market shares should be a consideration not only for developed economies but also for the least advantaged nations. Unlike Costa Rica and Panama where governments invest on factors that improve its competitiveness, Nicaragua government not even have a framework to measure competitiveness in tourism, therefore the interest on analyzing the industry and proposing strategies to leverage the current opportunities is presented in this document.

Nowadays tourism in Nicaragua represents the second largest industry in the nation, tourists from all over the world are interested in exploring the diverse options it offer, from ecotourism to surf camps or luxury beach resorts, the country offers a wide option of entertainment to satisfy the market needs, however still more work to be done to potentiate Nicaragua as a travel hotspot and having a more competitive industry.
It is true that the tourism has continued growing over the past five years and is expected to continue growing even more with the construction of an interoceanic canal that will connect the Caribbean Sea with the Pacific Ocean, yet the tourism industry is not completely prepared to deal with an increment on demand and take advantages of the opportunities that the canal will bring. Not only bad managing practices or inefficient marketing strategies from both private and public sector threaten the growth of the tourism but the poor infrastructure and lack of knowledge on ICT.
Through detailed analysis about the current situation of tourism in Nicaragua, this document will serve as an instrument to provide a general overview of the tourism industry to identify effective strategies and mechanism that foster the growth of the touristic sector of Nicaragua.
This paper will focus on the factors that have an impact on the competitiveness of the tourism industry of Nicaragua; at the same time, it examine successful cases from Central America that can help obtain insights on how an industry can be more competitive.
Striving for competing in bigger market shares should be a consideration not only for developed economies but also for the least advantaged nations. Unlike Costa Rica and Panama where governments invest on factors that improve its competitiveness, Nicaragua government not even have a framework to measure competitiveness in tourism, therefore the interest on analyzing the industry and proposing strategies to leverage the current opportunities is presented in this document.

ABSTRACT I
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT II
LIST OF FIGURES III
LIST OF TABLES IV
CHAPTER I. INTRODUCTION 1
1.1 PROBLEM STATEMENT 1
1.2 OBJECTIVES 2
1.3 LITERATURE REVIEW 2
CHAPTER II. TOURISM SECTOR OVERVIEW 5
2.1 TOURISM IN NICARAGUA 5
2.2 THE CANAL OF NICARAGUA AND ITS IMPACT IN THE ECONOMY AND TOURISM INDUSTRY. 7
2.2.1 Subprojects 9
2.3 CHARACTERISTICS OF THE TOURIST THAT VISITS NICARAGUA 11
2.3.1 Classification of the tourism in Nicaragua by activities. 13
2.4 NICARAGUA AS A TOURISM DESTINATION 14
CHAPTER III ANALYSIS OF THE COMPETITIVENESS OF TOURISM IN NICARAGUA UNDER THE DIAMOND MODEL OF MICHAEL PORTER. 20
3.1 DIAMOND MODEL ANALYSIS 20
Factor conditions: 20
Context for Firm Strategy and Rivalry: 21
Demand Conditions: 21
Related and Supporting Industries: 22
Government 24
Chance 24
3.2 INDUSTRY CLUSTER ANALYSIS 25
3.2.1 Cluster Map 25
3.2.2 Cluster Description 27
Direct Industries 27
Tourism Attractions 27
Hotels 28
Restaurants and other entertainment attractions. 30
Transportation 32
Travel Agencies 37
Indirect Industries 38
Government Agencies 38
Financial Services 41
Infrastructure 42
Communication Services 44
Education and Technical Training 45
Security and other support services 46
CHAPTER IV. ANALYSIS OF THE TOURISM INDUSTRY IN CENTRAL AMERICA: A comparison between Nicaragua, Costa Rica and Panama based on competitiveness and marketing and promotion strategies of each country. 48
4.1 Travel & Tourism Competitiveness Comparison 49
4.2 Analysis of the online Marketing and Promotion Strategies 54
NICARAGUA 54
COSTA RICA 58
PANAMA 62
CHAPTER V. PROPOSED STRATEGIES AND CONCLUSION 67
5.1 CONCLUSIONS 72
5.2 LIMITATIONS AND FUTURE WORK 73
REFERENCES 75

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Porter, M. (1998). Clusters and the New Economics of Competition. Harvard Business Review.
Nicaragua: Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper— Progress Report on National Human Development Plan as of 2010. (2011). International Monetary Fund.
Nourdin, S. (2003). Clustering & Innovation. ETOUR European Tourism Research Institute.

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