Mexican President Stars in New Tourism Pitch

By: nytimes.com

President Felipe Calderón of Mexico has a new role in efforts to lift Mexico’s sagging tourism industry, according to The Associated Press. Mr. Calderón, 49, will appear as an adventure guide of sorts in 30-minute television programs to appear starting next month on public television stations in the United States. He wears an Indiana Jones-style hat and a harness and descends a rope into a cavern, accompanied by Peter Greenberg, host of the “The Royal Tour” series.

The A.P. reports that Mr. Calderón also straps on scuba tanks to lead Mr. Greenberg into a sinkhole lake, known as a cenote, in the Yucatán and helps a Lacandon Indian paddle a boat down a jungle river. Mr. Calderón’s message is that Mexico is safe for tourists. Foreign tourism in 2010, not including border-area visitors, was down 6.3 percent from 2008 levels, and the first half of 2011 saw a 2 percent decline from the same period in 2010, according to the country’s central bank. 

The global economy and Mexico’s drug violence have been blamed, though foreign tourists have not been targets of the violence.

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