On Monday, Nov. 8, 2021 the United States reopened its borders, starting Arizona’s economy to recover. 

Both Canada’s and Mexico’s borders opened to fully vaccinated visitors traveling for non-essentials. With borders opening people will be able to travel for tourism to the country, passing through border states like Arizona. It’s been stated by the Arizona Office of tourism that the state relies heavily on visitors to boost their economy. 

Numbers of previous years show that visitors from Mexico spend $1.4 billion dollars in 2019 and $364 million in 2020. Along with visitors from Canada, there were 960,000 overnight visitors in 2019 and 250,000 in 2020. Amount of money spent in Arizona and Canadian visits in 2020 was significantly lower due to the pandemic. 

Arizona has been negatively impacted by COVID-19 over the course of nearly two years. With borders opening near the holiday travel rates are expected to increase. As stated by Deputy Director Becky Blaine of the Arizona Office of Tourism, “They will travel here for the holidays if they haven’t before, because there’s a lot of pent-up demand.” 

Business and marketing in Tucson and other Arizona cities are also expected to increase, hoping to see results in upcoming weeks. However, as more consumers show up, a worry for empty shelves grows. Currently a supply chain issue is occurring all over the Country, stocks could possibly be delayed. 

With the borders finally opening Arizona’s economy will see improvements in following months.