Chairman of the CTO’s Council of Ministers, Dionisio D’Aguilar.
In the wake of Hurricanes Irma and Maria, the Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) has revised the tourism sector’s growth by year end to just one or two per cent.
Chairman of the CTO’s Council of Ministers, Dionisio D’Aguilar, delivered this news at the World Travel Market earlier this week.
He pointed out that within the first half of this year, the region had been well on its way to outperforming the 2.5-3.5 per cent growth that had been forecasted for the period, growing by 5.2 per cent year-on-year in the six months to June 2017.
“During this period the region recorded 16.6 million international tourist arrivals, some 800 thousand more than in the first six months of 2016. Growth was recorded in all major source markets except South America, which contracted by 14.3 per cent. Up to June, the European market had grown by 7.9 per cent, Canada by 6.4 per cent, and despite the weak sterling, the UK grew by 4.8 per cent,” he outlined.
In the hotel industry, the half-year outcomes reported by STR Global showed that average occupancy increased marginally by 0.2 percentage points to 70.8 per cent, while the average daily room rate rose slightly by 0.2 per cent, moving from US$220.84 in 2016 to US$221.38 in 2017. Meanwhile, at the end of the first six months of 2017, cruise passenger arrivals to the Caribbean region reached an estimated 15.3 million, up four per cent over the corresponding period of 2016. “This performance represented the largest number of cruise passengers in the region at this time of year,” D’Aguilar indicated.
Then came the hurricanes, which triggered a slowdown as travel to destinations including; Anguilla, Barbuda, the British Virgin Islands, Dominica, Puerto Rico, both Dutch and French Saint Martin and the US Virgin Islands were
severely impacted.
“Consequently, we have revised our forecast for 2017 to between one and two per cent, with a similar growth rate projected for next year. This is expected to have a significant economic impact, based on predictions by the Caribbean Development Bank; according to the CDB every one per cent reduction in tourist arrivals could cost US$137 million in lost revenue,” the chairman continued.
Speaking on the falloff in flights, he stated the number of flights to the region had fallen by 6.7 per cent, while seat capacity contracted by 4.1 per cent.
While noting that it was too early to tell post-hurricane tourist arrivals, D’Aguilar said growth was still predicted “albeit slower than expected, which could still mean new record performance for the Caribbean despite the storms.”
“This is mainly due to the fact that some 75 per cent of the Caribbean was unscathed by the hurricanes and continued to welcome visitors,” he stressed.