Whale Watching Worldwide

Central America and Caribbean
Year Number of
whale
watchers
AAGR Number of
countries
Direct
expenditure
Indirect
expenditure
Total expenditure
1991 2,034 N/A 6 $1,524,000 $210,000 $1,734,000
1994 19,212 111.4% 12 $3,526,000 $3,831,000 $7,357,000
1998 90,720 47.4% 19 $5,968,000 $5,117,000 $11,085,000
2008 301,616 12.8% 23 $19,500,388 $34,267,141 $53,767,529
The Central American and Caribbean region covers a diversity of countries, from those situated along the
isthmus of the Americas with both Pacific and Caribbean coastlines, to the chain of islands that encompass
the Caribbean.
The whale watching industry in this region is as equally diverse as the countries, with some well‐established
mature whale watching industries and some in their very early stages. The most mature of these is
Dominica. The largest is a relatively young whale watching industry in Costa Rica. At the other end of the
scale is Jamaica, which has a new industry with one operator testing the opportunities to see sperm whales.
Since 1998, the industry overall across the region has taken a significant step up in terms of numbers of
whale watchers participating in tours, growing at 13% per year over the decade to an industry responsible
for $54 million in expenditure, well above the $11 million in 1998. In that same period, the number of
countries participating in whale watching has grown from 19 to 23.
236