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Monday, 05-01-2009    Issue 503    Skip Navigation Links
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Outlook

Caribbean Officials Working to Lure Visitors Back

Thursday, 18/09/2008

Caribbean tourism officials are working overtime to reassure reluctant travelers that plenty of sun-soaked islands were untouched by a recent spate of deadly tropical cyclones.

Potential visitors may assume the entire region was ravaged by four storms that pummeled several islands since mid-August –but they assume wrong, said Alec Sanguinetti, head of the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association.

The trade group is lobbying U.S. and Caribbean meteorologists to counter that impression by naming specific islands affected, and is urging local tourism officials to use Web cams and broadcast live video of idyllic beach settings.

It’s a challenging sell, since Caribbean weather reports and satellite images have shown an almost constant mass of spinning storms in recent weeks.

Tropical Storm Fay formed in mid-August, followed by Hurricanes Gustav, Hanna and Ike. The storms have killed more than 360 people across the western Caribbean and battered hotels and airports in Cuba, the Bahamas and the Turks and Caicos Islands.

Tourism is the Caribbean’s chief industry, drawing more than 15 million visitors to beach resorts and colonial capitals last year.

Storms so far have sidestepped Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands and the entire eastern Caribbean, including Martinique and Barbados.

Government officials are still calculating damages. Johnson JohnRose, spokesman for the Caribbean Tourism Organization, said it is too early to say how many tourists canceled hotel bookings, and Sanguinetti did not estimate how much resorts have lost.

But Hurricane Ike caused an estimated $5 million to $10 million in damage to the cruise ship terminal in Grand Turk over the weekend, according to officials with Carnival Corp., which owns the cruise ship pier and terminal on the island. And in Cuba, officials evacuated about 10,000 tourists from seaside hotels.

Hotels in the Bahamas meanwhile lost about $1 million in storm-related cancellations -- although some income was recovered when cruise ships were later diverted there from other islands hurt by Ike, said Vernice Walkine, director of the chain’s tourism ministry.

“It’s one of those difficult scenarios where some destinations end up benefiting as a result of the misfortune of others,” Walkine said.

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Tourist Slump in the Caribbean Frets Jamaican Authorities

Thursday, 20/11/2008

Jamaican officials plan to open a tourism training school as part of a campaign to reverse a downturn in visitors to the Caribbean island, including from the key U.S. market. “The (tourism) industry has been on a dangerous, downwards spiral over the last six months,” newly appointed Tourism Minister Ed Bartlett said in a recent statement.

 
Cancun Ushers in Quiet Spring Break
Monday, 27/03/2006
Caribeinside.com

With nearly half of its hotels still closed, Cancun has plunged down the lists of top-10 destinations for spring breakers from the United States this year. The Caribbean resort fell from number two last year to No. 8 this year for travelers booking their trips through CheapTickets.com. Miami was the top destination.

Tourism officials say they expect about 25,000 visitors this season, compared to 40,000 last year. Many of the spring breakers have moved further south to the quieter Maya Riviera or headed to Acapulco, the Pacific playground of the 1950s that has been steadily rising in popularity because of its all-night discos.

 

Caribbean Tourism Keeps Slip-Sliding Away

Thursday, 20/03/2008

Jamaican officials plan to open a tourism training school as part of a campaign to reverse a downturn in visitors to the Caribbean island, including from the key U.S. market.

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Newsmaker Rss

National Tour Association Appoints New Chairman

Michele Michalewicz, CTP, a Salt Lake City travel professional and president of Western Leisure, Inc. has been inducted as the 2009 chairman and CEO of the National Tour Association. NTA is the industry’s premier packaged travel association made up of more than 3,000 members from around the globe.

 
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Travel Agents to Be in Higher Demand in 2009

by Sharon Chambers

Peter Yesawich, president and CEO of Ypartnership, expects more consumers to turn to travel agents when planning their trips in 2009. Meanwhile, research conducted by Ypartnership states that the travel intentions of Americans remain strong as 71 percent of active travel households are planning at least one overnight trip during the next six months –the same amount as one year ago.

 
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CTO to Launch Social Network for Agents

by Gay Nagle Myers

The Caribbean Tourism Organization in January will launch online programs aimed at improving its North American chapter system and the way that travel agents do business.

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Golf Resorts Being Upscaled in Puerto Rico

This seaside stretch, a half-hour’s drive east of the airport in San Juan, is not placid in midday. Construction equipment rumbles through the beachfront while workers sweat out installing the marble floors and granite countertops in developer Donald Trump’s latest Caribbean venture.

 
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Antigua Air Traffic Slows Down

A flow control system implemented by air traffic controllers at the VC Bird International Airport in Antigua has been disrupting flights in and out of the island during the Christmas rush.

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