In the last five months, passenger traffic has plummeted to double digits, leading the South American country to drop out of the top 10 source of tourists for the first time in a decade.
Mexico registered a drop of 58,815 travelers from Brazil, between September 2022 and January of this year. The adjustment is mainly related to the actual visa requirement that came into force on August 18, which has led the South American country to leave the top 10 international tourist issuers to Mexico.
According to data from the Migration Policy Unit of the Ministry of the Interior (SEGOB), as of September of last year, the flow of Brazilians broke the floor of 20,000 travelers, which barely exceeded in January of this year.
As a result of an agreement that came into force in 2004, Brazilians visiting Mexico did not need a visa, since it was enough to register in the Electronic Authorization System (SAE) to enter.
The decision was made due to the “increase in irregular flows and the fact that, unfortunately, criminal groups profit, based on deception, from the interest of Brazilian nationals to migrate irregularly to the United States through Mexico,” the secretariats of Government (SEGOB) and Foreign Relations (SRE) said in a joint statement.
The passenger trend broke its upward trend since last August, and practically remained with a fall until December. In parallel, the load factor – which measures the seats occupied on flights – plummeted more than 10 percentage points to 62.4% in December, although it rebounded to 72.4% in January, according to data from the Federal Civil Aviation Agency ( AFAC).
Source: Expansion
