Financial Times: Cuban tourism boom to harm rest of Caribbean

What a surprise!

The sight of the Stars and Stripes being hoisted over the newly opened US embassy in Cuba last week, was one of the most visible signs yet of the diplomatic rapprochement between the long-term foes.

If President Barack Obama gets his way, the US Congress will soon go further still and lift its 55-year-old trade embargo on the island.

Such a move would be a major boon to the Cuban economy, not least by unleashing a torrent of big-spending American tourists on the island, which has largely been starved of such arrivals for more than half a century.

This, however, could prove disastrous for some of the small islands elsewhere in the Caribbean which are heavily dependent on tourism. They could see much of the US tourism trade they have come to reply on decamping to the large, and quite possibly cheaper, new competitor in their midst.

… continue reading the Financial Times Cuban thaw poses tourism threat to Caribbean neighbours

Code of Silence in effect over CL Financial Bailout

by Afra Raymond

Sad to say, this CL Financial bailout is resembling a situation in which well-connected persons are getting what they can, any way they can, but making sure not to get caught. Who were the beneficiaries of this lavish payout? What is this reluctance to release details?

That is the Code of Silence in effect.

I was not at all surprised at the reported statements of the Minister of Finance, Larry Howai, on the 22 July 2015 High Court judgment ordering him to provide the detailed information I had requested on the CL Financial bailout. The High Court granted a 28-day stay of execution and the Ministry is reportedly in consultation with its lawyers, claiming that “A decision will be made within the period of time allowed by the court,”. The article closed with this quote –

“…Finance Minister Larry Howai said in the statement it should be noted, none of the requests refer to “how over $25b was spent in the Clico bailout”…”

Given that the very request was for the detailed financial information which has been deliberately suppressed since 2009, it is of course impossible to say with any certainty just how much Public Money was actually spent on this CL Financial bailout. That is the inescapable fact at the center of this scandal. The Minister’s tautology is really a powerful explanation of this point.

The fundamentals are that Public Money must be managed and accounted for to a higher standard than that which applies to private money. That is the accepted position in terms of good practice in public administration. Larry Howai is a qualified accountant and was a career banker before his appointment as Minister of Finance & the Economy. I do not accept that Howai is unaware of these standards. We are entitled to a full and detailed accounting of how this vast sum of Public Money was spent…

… continue reading this article at Afra Raymond’s blog: CL Financial Bailout – The Hidden Truth

Adrian Loveridge: No need for Barbados to be the world’s most expensive tourism destination

Lots of beaches, sand, surf, sky everywhere. Why should people pay most for Barbados? Maybe they should… but why?

“We have to either redress this reality or perception or risk losing more market share.”

Adrian Loveridge – tourism expert, hotel owner

With Sterling reaching an eight year high against the Euro, making most European countries dramatically less expensive as holiday destinations and the Canadian Dollar below 80 cents when compared with its southern neighbour, the pressure is on to making Barbados perceived as offering value-for money.

So when a Spanish based bank with a huge presence in the United Kingdom recently published the results of a survey entitled ‘Barbados Caribbean island is most expensive place to visit’ it should send a huge tidal wave of realism to our various tourism policymakers and planners that we have to either redress this reality or perception or risk losing more market share.

Santander UK currently serves more than 14 million active customers from 921 branches and 66 regional Corporate Business Centres in the United Kingdom. As of 31^st December 2014 it was the most switched-to-bank attracting 1 in 4 new retail accounts.

The survey, largely undertaken by Opinium Research/ONS Travel Trends 2014, stated ‘British people visiting Barbados will feel a particular nasty sting in their wallets this summer, having to fork out an average of GBPounds 109 a day in spending money – not including the cost of a hotel’.

Around the world Barbados was placed as No. 1 in a list of the ten most expensive countries for British people to visit based on average daily spend. Second was the United Arab Emirates.

Just as alarming, is that Santander concluded that the daily costs of visiting Barbados have risen from GBPounds 79 per day or nearly 38 per cent since 2010.

US Ambassador to Barbados, 2006: Owen Arthur’s sugar decision “defies logic and sours prudent budget”

Sugar is over, finished…

With the recent revelation that the Government-owned Barbados Agricultural Management Company left 1000 acres of cane to rot in the fields – and that our country’s total 2015 sugar harvest might not reach even 10,000 tonnes, BFP re-blogs this post.

It’s time to leave sugar behind. It is a deep, dark hole that sucks money and energy from this nation. None of our children will cut cane or pick cotton, and the cost of Barbados sugar production is the highest in the world.

It’s over folks. It’s over.

Almost ten years ago, BFP asked Prime Minister Owen Arthur about his plan for sugar…

Remind me… what was the Barbados government plan to replace the sugar revenues?

Oh ya… I remember now…

1/ Beg the Europeans for money – playing upon white man’s guilt.

2/ Sell the rest of the island to foreigners.

Ya… good plan, Owen!

Barbados Free Press

“Instead of pouring more money into sugar, the Government of Barbados would be better served letting the industry die a peaceful death, as St. Kitts did in 2005.”

“This massive investment in the sugar industry defies logic and sours an otherwise prudent budget.”

“Sugar is so intrinsic to their national identity, however, that Barbadian taxpayers apparently support this fiscal profligacy.”

Mary Kramer, US Ambassador to Barbados, January 27, 2006

WikiLeaks just released a massive new treasure trove of US Embassy Bridgetown previously secret cables.

We’re looking at many of them in our article WikiLeaks: Massive release of Barbados US Embassy documents. You can help too by going to WikiLeaks Embassy Bridgetownpage and digging in!

But we’re going to post this cable on its own because it makes for very interesting reading.

Considering our current economic situation, Barbados Labour Party supporters will jump right on this cable as vindication…

View original post 2,096 more words

Santander study names Barbados as most expensive destination for British tourists

Lots of beaches, sand, surf, sky everywhere. Why should Brits pay more for Barbados?

Wonderful. Just what we need ’bout this island.

BFP pundit Adrian Loveridge has been pounding this subject for years. Looks like nobody has been listening…

UAE and Barbados most expensive destinations for British holidaymakers

The UAE and Barbados have been ranked the most expensive destinations for British tourists in a new survey published by Santander.

According to the report, the two destinations cost Brits more than £100 per day in spending money. By comparison, Poland and India are the cheapest destinations, costing just £30 per day on average.

These figures do not include the cost of hotel accommodation or flights.

With a direct flight to Barbados costing an average of £3,136 – flying out on 27 July, the busiest week of the summer – a couple going away for two weeks could expect to pay around £12,900 for their summer holiday, once accommodation is included, the report stated.

… continue reading the full report at Travel Daily UK

Weak Canadian dollar brings challenges for Barbados tourism industry

Adrian Loveridge – tourism expert, hotel owner

It is already more than halfway through the year and this is a time perhaps that our tourism policy planners are focusing on what marketing strategies can be effectively put in place to build on the first quarter increase in visitor arrivals.

As always, it is almost impossible to accurately predict what is going to happen in our global marketplaces and how that could impact on numbers, average stay and spend.

Important issues include the fall in the value of the euro earlier this year and whether this will be further impacted with the eventual solution to the Greek crisis. What effect will the first Conservative British government budget since 1995 have on the disposable income of most Brits? And finally, there is increased speculation about an impending recession in Canada, just at a time we were experiencing improved arrivals and airlift.

Having lived in Canada for some time, I know there is a psychological threshold when the Canadian dollar falls below 80 cents compared to the United States dollar. Naturally, Canadians then start to question whether they are truly obtaining value for money at holiday destination choices. It becomes an imperative to clearly demonstrate that we can offer a competitive product by at least attempting to reinforce component parts of the tourism industry that are more affordable.

While we will never be able to compete with the mass tourism regional offerings like Mexico, Dominican Republic, Cuba and alike, Barbados still has a myriad of more affordable accommodation choices. Of course lodging is only part of the equation, so personally I think there is room for a re-DISCOVER-like promotion specifically aimed at the Canadian market that helps minimise the currency value differential, which include not just restaurants, but attractions, activities, car rental and shopping.  

Outrageous, corrupt government contracts are killing Barbados

by David Comissiong, President of Clement Payne Movement

As we approach Barbados’ 50th year of Independence, I am calling on all patriotic Barbadians to join together and make a determined effort to uproot and eradicate the destructive remnants of the “Old Colonial System” that still exist in our supposedly independent nation.

And one particularly odious remnant is that aspect of the “Old Colonial System” that traditionally permitted the social and business elite of Barbados to have compliant members of the political directorate grant them outrageously preferential business and commercial arrangements that allowed them to feed on the substance of the Barbadian State and on the mass of predominantly black labourers, consumers, and – in more recent times- taxpayers!

Just take a cursory look at Barbados’ history and you will see exactly what I mean. From the earliest colonial days, the planter/merchant elite utilized a compliant House of Assembly to, inter alia:- supply themselves with cheap labour by legislating the enslavement of Blacks; grant themselves legal title to the lands they had occupied; give themselves a commercial advantage by prohibiting free Blacks and Coloureds from being able to give evidence in Court against them; control Black labour by enacting a Post- Emancipation “Masters and Servants Act”; prohibit the migration of Black labourers from Barbados; transfer the burden of falling international sugar prices unto the backs of the large black labouring class; use legislation and the Court system to ensure that the lands of bankrupt plantations did not fall into the hands of Blacks; use grant money from the British Government exclusively for the elite sugar planter class; and the list goes on and on.

In more recent “Independence times”, this old colonial phenomenon has been manifesting itself in the practice of predominantly black Parliamentarians and Ministers of Government granting amazingly preferential taxpayer- funded or guaranteed contracts to elite white Barbadian and foreign business-people – contracts that they would never dream of conferring upon black Barbadian business-people!

One such contract is the so-called “Take or Pay Contract” that the current Democratic Labour Party (DLP) administration granted to Mr Bizzy Williams’ Sustainable (Barbados) Recycling Centre Inc (SBRC) in June 2009. Under that contract, we, the taxpayers of Barbados, are obliged to underwrite a guaranteed minimum payment of $22.6 Million per year over a 20 year period to SBRC for the processing or managing of so-called municipal solid waste, whether or not the company is actually called upon to carry out work of the requisite minimum quantity! Thus, under this contract alone, we taxpayers are saddled with a minimum payment of $45 Million over the 20 year period.  

Pat Hoyos: Barbados not so far from a Greek-style meltdown

WHENEVER I ENVISAGE GREECE, lurching around in circles with a debt of 175 per cent of GDP on its shoulders, I see, not too far off on the horizon, little Barbados, walking with increasing shortness of breath with its own load of debt, now at 133 per cent of GDP.

In the Budget debate, Opposition Leader Mia Mottley called for a re-financing of the country’s debt in order to give us some fiscal breathing space.

Re-financing, if we could achieve it to a significant degree – remember, we have a debt of over $11 billion at present and rising by around a $1 billion every year – would certainly help us, as it would lower the amount we have to pay back every year, but for a far longer period.

Of course, it is just kicking the can debt down the road a few more years, so that not only our children and grandchildren will have to deal with it, but their offspring too, most likely. But, I wonder, could we get some sort of massive roll – over of our national debt that would bring it down to manageable proportions? Would we not have to go to the International Monetary Fund (IMF), the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank for such a massive financial undertaking at rates we could afford.

Now, if that is the case, Greece is instructive…

… continue reading this article at the Nation News: A looming fiscal tragedy of Grecian proportions

Increased taxes and costs are killing tourism. Barbados government actions “simply defies rationale”

Adrian Loveridge – tourism expert, hotel owner

I had hoped to dedicate this week’s column to the new measures put in place announced in the 2015 budget to stimulate spending, especially in the tourism sector.

Unless I missed something while trawling through the 57 pages, not a single ‘incentive’ has been announced that would be likely to encourage increased domestic spending across the sector.

Conversely, many could fairly claim that the additional $200 million in taxation annually will further restrain people’s ability to take a ‘staycation’ or enjoy one of many excellent restaurants.

Government Broke: VAT refunds two years past due.

In fact private sector led initiatives like the re-DISCOVER dining promotion have been forced to scale down any paid promotion, due to the continued inability to reclaim due and payable VAT refunds, now overdue for more than two years. This in itself is ludicrous and short sighted as many of the participating restaurants do not qualify and are unable to apply the reduced rate of 7.5 per cent VAT, but obligated to pay the higher 17.5 per cent rate.

So Government could be easily losing up to $2 million a year in lost taxes. Add the duties and taxes lost in the included wine element and that figure could well be significantly more, let alone the employment this promotion generates.

Until we witness some real actual sustained recovery in tourism, it is very difficult to comprehend why any Government thinks that increasing taxation and operating costs will reduce the time it takes to attain that objective. 

Barbados national crisis: Sargassum seaweed damaging tourism and fishing

Have a look at these Nation News videos that fairly depict the impact of sargassum seaweed on on beaches, and then ask yourself why our government isn’t calling “ALL HANDS ON DECK!”.

Sometimes I think I’m the crazy one when problems and priorities seem so obvious yet the government does nothing.

Barbados government should lower taxes on tourist rental cars

“I am pleading with the Minister of Finance to reconsider lowering the rate of VAT on car rental for at least our overseas visitors. Car rental is a critical component part of our export tourism offerings.”

Hired cars unreasonably expensive in Barbados

Adrian Loveridge – tourism expert, hotel owner

Whether travelling on business or pleasure, I usually hire a car, because for me it adds a huge extra dimension to the experience and dramatically increases the options available.

With an imminent budget on the horizon, I would implore the Minister of Finance to look again at our car rental sector, if we are going to maintain the recent increase in visitor arrival numbers.

Personally I do not think this segment of our tourism offerings gets the attention it deserves and that is probably partially due to the lack of knowledge and understanding of the enormous contribution it makes.

Just one of our larger vehicle rental operators has a fleet of almost 130 cars. If you average a rental period at 7 days, with a driver and at least one passenger, that amounts to over 13,000 persons each year. Of course the fleet size varies enormously, but from recently writing to over 30 Barbados based entities offering car rental, it gives you some idea of the importance in economic terms they play overall.

Rarely do I pay more than US$150 for a week’s rental in North America or GB Pounds 100 in the United Kingdom for a compact car, so for many of our visitors it can be quite a shock to pay what are considered ‘normal’ rates on Barbados. But it’s easy to see why, because of the taxes on purchasing cars here is staggeringly different to those where our major source markets emanate from.

Also surprising is the sad and difficult to understand logic behind the decision not to lower the rate of value-added-tax (VAT) on vehicle rental when the adjustments were recently made to hotels and some restaurants.

Perhaps it is because our tourism planners and policy makers do not fully understand the secondary benefits and economic importance that the flexibility of having a rental vehicle brings. It enables our visitors to sample more restaurants for lunch and dinner, patronise our attractions, activities, increases shopping options and generates fuel purchases among others.

Central Bank of Barbados still hiding from news media

That’s Governor ‘Weasel Words’ Worrell on the right… er, left!

Over a year ago Dr. DeLisle Worrell, the head thug of the Central Bank of Barbados, took issue with a Nation News story about the central bank.

So did Worrell ask the paper for space to present his thoughts to the citizens? Did he demand an apology, retraction or correction? Did he write an article to be published in the media or on the bank’s website?

Nope… Worrell banned Nation journalists from all bank events. Worrell wants to control what the press says about him and banning them was his stupid, thuggish reaction to an article he disagreed with.

This is so typical of the Bajan elites’ contempt for freedom of the press and the right of citizens to hold government officials and institutions accountable.

Journalist Ian Bourne

Then the central bank issued a press release in an attempt to backpedal, but as our friend Ian Bourne of Bajan Reporter points out, the Central Bank of Barbados hasn’t held a quarterly statement media briefing since then.

Bajan Reporter is sticking to its guns and hasn’t published the bank’s quarterly reports, and won’t until the institution resumes press briefings. In return, the bank has cut off advertising revenues to The Bajan Reporter, but as Bourne says, he will not sacrifice his dignity at the alter of CBB’s coffers.

And as Worrell is showing – once a thug, always a thug.

Check out The Bajan Reporter for the whole story on how the Central Bank of Barbados is failing to be accountable and transparent to citizens and government alike: Bajan Reporter will carry CBB’s media statements as soon as Quarterly Press Conferences resume.

Barbados luxury tourism image becoming a long-term liability?

Typical roadside wildlife: The not so rare Genus “plasticus baggis trashisus”

“Barbados an upscale tourism destination? Really?

Open your eyes and your nostrils! Clean up the garbage strewn throughout this island.

Until we do that, the demographics of our tourism business won’t matter.”

Aging demographic of British tourists prompts questions about the next generation, but we have a more immediate problem…

submitted by Passin Thru

Barbados has never been, and will never be, a mass-tourism destination. We’re too far away from our main European markets, the farthest Caribbean destination from the North American markets, and not different enough from the closer South American markets to ever sustain mass-tourism at competitive rates. Nevermind considerations about the small size of the island, the need to import most supplies for tourists and the overpopulation of the south around the Bridgetown corridor – it is the higher transportation costs and longer time necessary to the destination that ensures we can never be competitive on a mass basis.

And that’s good on the cultural / lifestyle side of the coin, but bad on the economic side.

Barbados has always had to offer something other than mass tourism, and what we chose to offer was the image of luxury and upscale destination where the upper-middle class could run shoulders with the super rich and famous (or at least enjoy the same air and views.)

That choice worked in the past, but there are problems now that the younger generation of Brits (our main market) doesn’t have the money that their parents did.

Blame it on the weak UK / European economies, blame it on out of control EU socialism and mass unsustainable immigration into the UK from Third-World African, Middle East and near-Asian countries. Blame it on whatever you like, but it is obvious that younger Brits don’t have the disposable incomes that their parents once did.

So our largest group of tourists – the Brits – continue to age, while the next generation is either going elsewhere or can’t afford Barbados like they used to.

This is not a good trend for Bim.

What’s to be done about this demographic trend of aging Brit tourists and retirees?

I’m no expert, but obviously from the lack of ideas, plans and strategies emanating from government and the tourism organisations, I’m not the only one without a clue about what to do.

I do have one suggestion though…

Barbados is an upscale tourism destination? Really?

Open your eyes and your nostrils! Clean up the garbage strewn throughout this island.

Until we do that, the demographics of our tourism business won’t matter and we will continue to lose our image of an upscale destination.

Passin Thru

 

United States again puts Barbados GOVERNMENT on watch list for copyright violations and theft of intellectual property.

“Cable operators and television and radio broadcasters, some government-owned (e.g., in Barbados), reportedly refuse to negotiate with the PROs for compensation for public performances of music.”

… from the Office of the United States Trade Representative 2015 annual review of intellectual property rights (Special 301 Report)

From the report…

Barbados remains on the Watch List in 2015. The United States continues to have concerns about the interception and retransmission of U.S. cable programming by local cable operators in Barbados and throughout the Caribbean region without the consent of, and without adequately compensating, U.S. rights holders. The United States also has continuing concerns about the refusal of Barbadian TV and radio broadcasters and cable and satellite operators to pay for public performances of music. (See Section I). The United States urges the Government of Barbados to take all administrative actions necessary, without undue delay, to ensure that all composers and songwriters receive the royalties they are owed for the public performance of their musical works. In one case, the local PRO won a case before the Supreme Court regarding the appropriate tariff to be paid for broadcasts of its members’ music, and six years after that decision the PRO still has not received its monies because the requisite hearing at the administrative level has not yet been conducted.

In addition, the United States urges the Government of Barbados to adopt modern copyright legislation that protects works in both physical and online environments and to take steps to prevent the unauthorized and uncompensated retransmission of copyrighted musical and audiovisual content. The United States looks forward to working with Barbados to resolve these issues.

U.S. musical works are being publicly performed by radio and TV broadcasting stations without obtaining licenses from the appropriate public performances rights organizations (PROs). This problem has been reported again this year in Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, St. Lucia, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines. In some cases, the alleged infringing broadcaster is licensed by the government or is government-owned, which makes such actions even more troubling.

Cable operators and television and radio broadcasters, some government-owned (e.g., in Barbados), reportedly refuse to negotiate with the PROs for compensation for public performances of music. PROs also assert that they have struggled to advance their legal claims in the local courts and, even when successful, cannot obtain payments. These problems have been reported in Barbados, Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago as well as Antigua and Barbuda, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, St. Lucia, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines.

With regard to cable and satellite broadcasting of copyrighted network programming, although Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Jamaica, St. Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, and St. Vincent and the Grenadines currently maintain a statutory licensing regime that includes a requirement to pay royalties to rights holders, reportedly, royalties are not being paid.

Download the full report PDF 500kb here

US Department of State Barbados page

Loveridge: After unprecedented government concessions to Sandals, the company pays only lip service to Bajan agricultural suppliers.

Sandals’ Butch Stewart doesn’t look like he’s starving, but little of what he and his resort guests eat is Bajan.

“What must be clear to Government, is that after granting the unprecedented unilateral concessions to Sandals (which almost two years later not a single other hotel on Barbados has been able to obtain), Sandals must do more than give lip service to supporting our agricultural sector.”

Adrian Loveridge – tourism expert, hotel owner

First let me declare my absolute and total support for those advocating the use and consumption of more locally produced items especially by our tourism industry.

When the head of the Barbados Agricultural Society recently boasted that Sandals Barbados were purchasing 1,000 lbs of local produce each week, no-one thought to question him as to what this actually means. In all fairness to James Paul, he stated that they were trying to increase this amount, but let’s look at the current figures.

If the hotel is full that is a capacity of 580 guests each night who have every meal and snack included in the cost. This equates to a volume of just 4 ounces per person per day.

And that is before any allowance is made for the quoted 600 staff and management taking meals on the property.

The United States is currently the largest market for Sandals and the average American, according to internet informed information, is 36.6 years of age, is 5 feet 9 inches tall and weighs 190 lbs if male, or 5 feet 4 inches and 164 lbs if female. Again based on averages each American consumes nearly 5.5 lbs of food per day or a short ton per annum.

Over a year this includes 29 lbs of French Fries, 23 lbs of pizza, 24 lbs of ice cream, 53 gallons of soda, 24 lbs of artificial sweetener and a staggering 2,736 lbs of sodium, which is 47 per cent above the recommended medical limit. All of which add up to 2,700 calories daily.

The question should also be asked, is the average Sandals guest likely to consume more or less than they do at home than on a fully all-inclusive vacation?

In reality then the 4 ounces of ‘local produce’ represents less than 4 per cent of consumables used daily, therefore a proverbial drop in the ocean. 

Talk, talk, talk. Does anybody really do anything with new economic and tourism ideas?

Adrian Loveridge – tourism expert, hotel owner

The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) was kind enough to invite me and a large number of representatives from both the private and public sector to a half day discussion forum last week.

To quote their own documentation the objective was to ‘Maximise Bridgetown’s economic and cultural activity’ by leveraging ‘existing institutions (tangible and intangible) and infrastructure (historic buildings and public spaces)’ by garnering ‘support from the local business sector to diversity night-time (after 6 pm) economic and cultural activities’.

Creative suggestions from the attending group flowed like flood water but towards the end of the main session there was one sobering observation by a member of the assembly. He mentioned that he had not heard more than one new idea over the last twenty years.

And that is where the reality kicks in. As a country we do not lack the vision or identifying practical projects. Where we seem to fail dismally is the implementation.

The same person suggested that we needed a fulfillment ‘Czar’ and that comment is probably the one which will stay with me for the longest time out of the entire four hour duration. Whether any administration has the ‘intestinal fortitude’ to make this happen without giving the job to yet another political crony, I seriously doubt, but we can perhaps live in hope. 

Barbados Government’s unrealistic taxes & inability to pay tax refunds is causing dumping, ruining the environment and our tourism economy

“Clearly the commercial banks will not extend interest free overdrafts to companies like ours to allow for Government’s inability to meet their obligations, so the financial challenges are further compounded as time goes by.”

“Many businesses have been forced to wait more than two years for submitted VAT refunds without any interest being paid.”

Indiscriminate garbage dumping linked to unrealistic tax structure

Adrian Loveridge – tourism expert, hotel owner

While at first this week’s column may seem to stray from the subject ‘matter’ and purpose, the consequence of certain actions has a direct negative effect on our tourism performance.

As a business we get absolutely no ‘free’ state collection of garbage.

We sort and separate everything we can with the wonderful assistance of B’s Recycling and virtually everything else we pay private contractors to collect and dispose of at a considerable cost.

Therefore when the Municipal Solid Waste Tax was imposed, almost without warning, the additional (in our case) $8,000 a year in further unbudgeted taxation was especially irksome as we have been asked to pay for something we do not in any way benefit from directly.

Compounding this already unfair situation is the announced tipping fee which the waste disposal companies will be forced to pass on to their customers like us.

This at a time when we are among many businesses who have been forced to wait more than two years for submitted VAT refunds without any interest being paid.

Clearly the commercial banks will not extend interest free overdrafts to companies like ours to allow for Government’s inability to meet their obligations, so the financial challenges are further compounded as time goes by.

From a tourism perspective, I also really also wonder if our policymakers have truly thought this through. While you cannot condemn any Government for indiscriminate dumping, clearly there has been a marked increase in this unfortunate practice, especially in some of our outstanding natural beauty spots.  Does anyone think for a single second that our visitors do not notice these blights on our amazing landscape? 

Bargain airfares offer hope for Barbados Tourism – but only if we act!

“If anyone realistically thinks… that lower prices do not drive additional business, then think again.”

Atlanta to Barbados – Return from US$227!!!

Adrian Loveridge – tourism expert, hotel owner

I subscribe to a website called airfarewatchdog.com which for those of you are unfamiliar with, monitors airfares across the world.

When Delta Airlines resumed their flights from Atlanta to Barbados, I placed an alert which several times daily, automatically scans all available options on that route whether direct flights or through connecting cities. Last week a series of alerts advised that for certain days and months, subject to advance booking, return air fares were available as low as US$227 with the amalgamated American Airlines and US Air.

Delta flights are of course direct and non-stop twice a week on Thursdays and Saturdays, while flying with the other carriers would involve a change in Charlotte or Miami, obviously resulting in a longer overall travel time.

But look at the fare, and if anyone realistically thinks for at least part of our target markets, that lower prices do not drive additional business, then think again.

I also monitor the very popular Trip Advisor Barbados Forum site and could not help notice that a lady had also spotted the bargain fares and had no hesitation in booking her family of five to Barbados, due to the lower cost travel opportunity.

How can we as a tourism driven country better take full advantage of these chances, especially as they cost us absolutely nothing in terms of marketing dollars?

Maybe by following other examples, both in terms of the tourism industry, but also other sectors, by including a ‘last minute’ portal on the national website with links. It could even be branded as a distinctive by separate product with catchy name like ‘spontaneous’.