Chairman of the Barbados Hotel and Tourism Association (BHTA), Geoffrey Roach.
WHILE the stakeholders in the tourism industry are concerned with its survival, they recognise that given that a health crisis is at the root of the economic challenges they face, it is imperative that a balance is struck with the health concerns.
So says Chairman of the Barbados Hotel and Tourism Association (BHTA), Geoffrey Roach. Delivering remarks during the recently held virtual Third Quarterly Meeting of the Association, Roach maintained that balancing health and economics must remain the focus.
“When we look at all that has happened within the country, if we look at the issues of practising social distancing, the wearing of masks, we go back to the early days of the alphabet system where we were only allowed to go out on days where all last name starting with a particular letter – that all was really about balancing health and economics, ensuring that livelihoods could be maintained and that is going to carry through to the re-emerging of tourism in the country,” he stated.
The BHTA Chairman went further, contending that as flights slowly return in increasing numbers and visitors start to occupy the accommodation sector again and visit our attractions and restaurants, that “balancing act becomes even more acute”, to reduce the likelihood of the spread of the virus.
His comments came as he reflected on the cruise sector, which he said is particularly important to sustaining the attraction business in Barbados. Roach noted that the sector is the main source of revenue for many of the attractions. Additionally, he noted that prior to COVID, the cruise sector also provided an opportunity for hotels in terms of the homeporting traffic, where persons had the option to cruise and stay. He bolstered the point while referring to the homeporting passenger statistics between 2015 and 2019, he indicating that the number of homeporting passengers increased by 35 per cent during the period.
“That was a significant increase in opportunities for cruise and stay visits. Obviously now with no cruise vessels calling on Barbados, that opportunity doesn’t exist and if you’ve been following the story with the cruise, you would recognise that there are quite a few matters with cruise that still need to be addressed,” the BHTA official stated.
He added that given the nature of cruising, the cruise protocols would require more attention that would be applied for airlift, given that cruise vessels call on a number of destinations as part of a regular itinerary. He said there would therefore be a need to ensure that the health protocols across the various destinations in the itinerary are in sync. With that in mind, he disclosed that there are discussions that have started on cruise protocols and he is hopeful that in a very short time those protocols which would support the re-emerging of cruise in the Southern Caribbean would be in place. Roach’s comments came as he said that while some cruise lines have been sailing, not to any ports, but in the open waters for the length of the cruise, he is uncertain as to how appealing this would be to passengers and said there is therefore a need to get the industry back to what it was.
“There is a need to get back as safely as possible to what is the traditional form of cruising recognising as well that there is a significant revenue impact if the traditional form of cruising cannot be restarted,” he added. (JRT)