One of the areas discussed was marketing, and the SHTA learnt that budgetary cuts have not affected marketing plans, but familiarisation trips for foreign press and tour operators have been cut.
Local tourism officials have reported that the new charter flight from Brazil with GOL Airlines is overbooked. Between June and December, the flight is expected to provide 5,000 seats to the island. Brazilian airline GOL has seen record demand growth in its international network especially in the Caribbean.
The Island Government is reportedly committed to strengthening Sint Maarten's position in the Brazilian market.
Several Caribbean island nations are looking at the BRIC countries as an avenue of new opportunities and as a new frontier for sustainable development. The BRIC countries are Brazil, Russia, India and China.
One of the areas keenly being explored and developed is tourism. China has developed a Caribbean region policy whereby it hopes to enhance relations with Latin American and Caribbean countries in order to achieve common development.
China seeks to deepen political trust, economic cooperation, and cultural exchanges to ensure stable development of bilateral friendly cooperation for mutual benefit. The world Tourism Organization (WTO) predicts that China is becoming the fourth most important outbound travel market, and will in 2020 have 100 million outbound travellers.
More Asians are heading abroad on holidays than ever before according to the WTO and Asia's outbound growth rates and travel potential far exceed that of other economic blocs, such as Europe or the Americas.
The top reasons that Asians travel, among them is health and wellness, city breaks, shopping and visiting TV and film locations. The Chinese get much of their travel information on the internet. Group travel is losing popularity and independent travel is gaining. Asian tourism is becoming more activity-based rather than destination based.
Indians like to visit several countries on each trip. Shopping is the favourite activity of Indian tourists. On average, Indian tourists spend more per day than other nationalities. India is Asia's leader in real tourism growth.
The Bahamas is one Caribbean nation that is taking advantage of the potential that exist for Chinese visitors. China has signed an approved destination agreement with the Bahamian Government. Statistics show that roughly 1000 Chinese have visited The Bahamas each year since 2003. Even though there are no direct flights between The Bahamas and China, tourists transfer through Toronto, London, New York, Chicago and Philadelphia.
Once our island nation achieves country status, the Minister responsible for Economic Development needs to develop a BRIC policy with respect to the fastest developing economies of Brazil, Russia, India and China. We are already on the right track where Brazil is concerned, however we need to immediately build on that so in 2011 we either double or triple the number of Brazilians coming to the island especially during the summer month period often referred to as the slow season.
Commitment to sustainable development is necessary if we want to deliver sustainable employment opportunities for our people and additional business for our commercial sectors. A new approach, a new way of thinking outside the box will be the success of country Sint Maarten.
Roddy Heyliger
