…How could you, America? asks Assamba
Minister of Tourism, Entertainment & Culture, Aloun N’dombet Assamba has pledged the government’s full support behind the anticipated regional lobby to request that stopover visitors who travel by air be afforded the same window of opportunity to ‘set their house in order’ as cruise ship passengers.
Cruise ship passengers will be able to travel to the Caribbean without a passport until June 2009, unlike stopover visitors who must meet the passport requirement by January 8, 2007.
In a statement issued yesterday, Assamba noted that “whereas the deadline shift from January 8, 2007 to June 1, 2009 is welcome news in that it gives us time to extend our public education programme among potential American cruise ship visitors, the disparity created with land-based visitors will have a crippling effect on the local tourist industry”.
She approved the statement made by secretary-general of the Caribbean Tourism Organisation (CTO), Vincent Vanderpool Wallace that “…it is incomprehensible that the US government would approve an amendment that excludes air arrivals from the Caribbean and therefore grant an additional advantage to cruise lines in the Caribbean, which already enjoy a significant competitive advantage, especially since the cruise lines also supported the inclusion of air arrivals”.
Stopover visitors to the Caribbean, she pointed out, represented more than half of the number of tourists, and significantly more revenue to tourism-dependent economies.
“If the US Government does not accommodate our request, we can expect significant and devastating fallout in revenues in 2007 from a sector that has become the region’s main economic driver,” she cautioned.
Assamba said she had been working closely with regional counterparts through the CTO, as this was not a matter for individual states, but for the entire region.