MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Half a million tourists.

Magallanes Region in the extreme south of Chile, received 509.869 visitors during 2000, a 14% increase over the previous year.

According to the Regional Tourist Board Officer, Mr. Julio Arenas, "we hope to keep this sustained growth of the industry but we're also concerned about opening new opportunities and new sites". Mr. Arenas was referring to the Torres del Paine National Park which attracted almost 75% of all visitors meaning the rest of Magallanes is still to be discovered.

Of the over half a million visitors, 389,866 were foreigners and 120,000 Chileans. Among foreigners, Argentines were top of the list with 133,000 visitors, followed by Americans 13,000 and Germans 7,500.

At national level Chile is the ninth most visited country of the Americas according to the World Tourist Office with 1,742.666 tourists in 2000, a 6,8% over 1999. Argentina supplied 857,000 visitors; Peru, 156,000; United States, 134,000 and Bolivia 110,300, totaling 1,457,350 from the Americas. Of the 229,599 visitors from Europe, 44.000 came from Germany, France, 33.000, Britain, 28,500, Italy 20,000.

However the countries which recorded the highest increase were Canadians (12%), Americans (7,8%) and Europeans (7,1%).