In less that two months, CARICOM Heads of Government are once again meeting in The Bahamas, this time for a Tourism Summit on 8-9 December at the Atlantis Resort on Paradise Island, The Bahamas.
Prime Minister of The Bahamas, the Right Honourable Hubert Ingraham who is Chairman of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) and CARICOM Head of Government with lead responsibility for Tourism, will preside over the two-day meeting in which regional and international tourism officials, representatives of the Caribbean Tourism Organisation (CTO) and the Caribbean Hotel Association (CHA) will join CARICOM Heads of Government in searching for solutions for the Region's largest industry, now facing a number of threats.
The industry's importance to the Region cannot be over-emphasised, contributing as it does some 25 per cent of the Region's Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and a significant share of the Region's employment. It is this which led Heads of Government at their Emergency Meeting in The Bahamas two months ago to agree to launch a major advertising and marketing campaign to help counter the downturn in the industry caused by the events of September 11.
Tourism promotion and market development and air transportation have been identified as major issues to be discussed by the Summit. The re-engineering of the Caribbean tourism product will also be in focus, specifically as it relates to price, quality and diversity of the product and service levels, which have been identified as critical factors for the sustainability of this sector.
The sector will come under the spotlight again when the CARICOM Heads of Government join their counterparts from other Association of Caribbean States (ACS) Member States in Margarita, Venezuela on 11-12 December, where the issue of the Caribbean as a Zone of Sustainable Tourism will be on the agenda.
