If a proposed bill makes it through the Senate and the House, the U.S. government might jump on the video conferencing bandwagon.
The State Department Authorization bill would pave the way for a two-year pilot program using video conferencing for visa interviews in large nations such as China, India and Brazil - which lack enough regional U.S. consular offices to make the process easy.
The Senate hopes making travel visas easier to obtain will encourage more international travelers to journey to the United States.
'Overseas visitors are walking stimulus packages, each spending an average of more than $4,000 per visit to the U.S.,' U.S. Travel Association President and CEO Roger Dow said in a statement. 'In geographically large countries such as India, China and Brazil, a lack of consular offices means that entire tour groups or families must travel hundreds of miles to the nearest U.S. Consulate to apply for a visa. Insufficient access to U.S. consulates is one of the reasons we continue to see a lag in visitation to the U.S. from abroad.'
Brazil, with a total land area greater than the continental United States, has only four consulates in the entire country. Therefore, a family in Manaus, Brazil, which has nonstop service to the United States, would have to travel 1,335 miles to the nearest consulate in Brazil to be interviewed for a U.S. visa.
According to Dow, the United States welcomed 2.4 million fewer overseas visitors in 2009 than in 2000, costing the U.S. economy an estimated $509 billion in total spending and $32 billion in direct tax receipts.
Alice Straight is a TMCnet editor. To read more of her articles, please visit her columnist page.Edited by Michael Dinan