MEXICO CITY — After postponing Tianguis 2020 from March 2020 to September 2020, organizers now say Mexico’s annual tourism conference will be reinvented as a two-part event, the first being digital and proceeding in September 2020, followed by an on-location event in Merida in March 2021.

“As a result of a long and careful process of analysis by the Organizing Committee and of a consensus with leaders and key actors from the tourism industry, today we announce that the 45th edition of  Tianguis Turístico has evolved into a new format in response to the new reality imposed by the global crisis of COVID-19. It has transformed into an innovative event with both a digital component and a live, in-person version that will be held on different dates,” said the Secretary of Tourism of Mexico, Miguel Torruco Marques.

The first ‘Digital Tianguis Turístico’ will take place this September. Torruco Marques said the details of September 2020 event and the changes it implies will be announced at a press conference in the coming months, once the critical phase of the COVID-19 health crisis has passed.

He says the priorities with both the digital and the on-location events are to ensure protection of the health of all Mexicans and participants of Tianguis Turístico; promptly reactivate tourism in the country; empathize and support an industry that has been financially affected; further evolve and innovate Tianguis Turistico, in alignment with the latest trends in the meetings segment; establish the new digital and inclusive format of Tianguis Turístico; and promoting the continuation “of an event that belongs to all of us, one that we should preserve as an important institution that represents us all,” says Torruco Marques.

Yucatan Governor, Mauricio Vila Dosal said that September’s digital event, dubbed Tianguis 360, “aims to strategically reactive our industry so we can send a strong message to Mexico and the world in September that we are resuming our agenda and propelling our tourism offering with even more strength, so that come March of 2021 we can give our plans and strategies continuity when we meet again in Yucatan in person.”

So far the on-location 45th edition of Tianguis Turístico is scheduled for March 21 to 24, 2021 in Merida.