At first glance, this bold headline on the back page of today’s Sunday Sun gives the impression that Barbados tourism industry is thriving. ‘We have every reason to be confident of topping US$1 Billion this year,’ President of the Barbados Tourism Authority said. And ‘that Barbados was shaping up to reach this figure for the first time, after last year’s record earnings!’ One vital component of ‘this projected increases in tourist spending’ seems to have been left out of the equation!
Inflation!
A rise from US$953 million to US$1 billion represents an increased overall spend of less than 5 per cent! But with inflation hovering somewhere between 7 and 10%, then aren’t the projected figures just indicating that everything is costing our visitors more? Unless earnings from tourism do not rise about the average annual rate of inflation, we are simply falling behind.
Visitors are factually spending less in real terms.
And what about the ‘guaranteed 400,000 cruise ship passengers’ per year from the agreement signed last October with Carnival Corporation? Our neighbours, St. Vincent and St. Lucia, have been recording massive increases of over 52% in cruise ship passenger arrivals, and that I understand is without a contracted Carnival agreement. Are all these ‘guaranteed’ additional passengers going to arrive only in the winter months? If so, why on earth would we agree to give Carnival any money or concessions; where else would the ships go?
Certainly not Alaska or Europe!
These questions have to be answered if the headline grabbing articles are going to mean anything at all, other than trying to spin what is really a poor performance in tourism.
Adrian Loveridge
12 August 2007
Leave the beast to wallow in his Sh__t and not try to haul him out of the mess he has created.
This clown Lynch spends more time playing golf nowadays than doing the peoples work as recent as yesterday he had a game at Sandy Layne with Carlye Greaves while he elevating his social staus the island stuggles with its tourism industry.
He ought to have been fired a long time ago and someone else given the job but guess if there is nothing there to select from we are stuck with this clown, pity for us.
Turnover is NOT profit!!!
Could someone please tell Stuart Layne and Noel Lynch that they need to stop playing games with the spending and arrival figures.
I don’t understand because the Central Bank statistics state beyond a doubt that cruise ship arrivals increase 25% in the 3rd quarter and turnaround the 17% slump in the first 2 quarters. The overall decline in 2006 compared to 2005 was an improvement.
So Adrian what is your point?
http://www.centralbank.org.bb/Publications/EconRevDec2006.pdf
Anonymous….
‘cruise ship arrivals increase 25% in the 3rd quarter’
Sorry, you have completely lost me.
I was talking about 2007 (and so was BTA President/CEO Stuart Layne).
Quarter ONE. January 1st to March 31st.
Quarter TWO. 1st April to 30th June.
Quarter THREE. 1st July to 30th September.
Can the Central Bank look into the future accurately?
More confusion……
The Sunday Sun reported that Stuart Layne of the BTA had quoted a figure of US$953 million revenue from tourism in 2006.
Yet today, the Barbados Advocate quotes a figure supplied from the Barbados Economic Report of BDS$1.8 billion (or US$900 million for last year.
What about the other US$53 million?
Which is the correct figure, or are all these statistics issued just guesses?
‘The report stated that this represents an increase of 2.7 per cent compared to the BDS$1.7 billion earlier’.
So with inflation running around 7.2 per cent in 2006, the only conclusion that can be reached is that if there was any increase in visitor arrivals, then the average visitor is spending less.
2.7 per cent rise in earnings.
7.2 per cent inflation rate.
It simply means we are falling further behind.