What would be his opinion on the current state of Barbados if he was alive? The uptick in criminal activity, the runaway tourism development – the latest being the proposed plan announced by Senior Minister William Duguid to relocate the Civic Centre in Holetown?
Barrow did say one day Barbadians would wake up and find that we don’t have a country. It is fair to say successive governments in recent decades have gone all in on tourism. He would also be disappointed about the state of the Democratic Labour Party (DLP), its demise since his passing has been well documented.
The blogmaster has reposted a 2008 blog to show that the more things change in Barbados, the more they remain the same. Note several of the links in the blog are broken due to circumstances out of the control of the blogmaster.
The local newspaper which Barbadians have supported over the years but which has failed the PEOPLE more and more of late is at it again. In today’s version the newspaper was encouraged to print the story that the Holetown Beach is scheduled for a $5.5 million beach upgrade. The reason given for the upgrade by the Coastal Zone Management Unit is to “stabilise the shoreline and improve public access to the beach.” The editor needed to go on, maybe an Editor’s note? We thought we would never say it but with the departure of Harold Hoyte the Fontebelle print has gone to the dogs.
We welcome the remedial work which is to be done. It does not take great effort to understand that beautiful beaches is a major component of our tourism product. Barbados has avoided going the route of establishing casinos, water parks and other ancillary tourist attractions which some say would attract more tourists to our shores. If we allow our beaches to deteriorate it would obviously have a negative affect on our tourism product. Over the years we have never truly diversified our economy to relieve our dependence on the tourist dollar.
The upgrade on the West Coast should interest Barbadians a great deal. The newspaper report suggests that part of the upgrade is to improve public access to the beach. The BU family would know that we have been very critical of the Barbados authorities who have folded to the almighty dollar, the end result is that we have a West Coast concrete jungle which has obliterated most of the windows to the sea.
I took these photo’s by Sandy Lane, the first one is self explanatory, in the second one you can see one of these notices in the left hand side of the image. Does Sandy Lane own the beach here? I don’t think so, so why have they these notices along the stretch of beach outside the hotel.
If I want to go and sit on the sand amongst all these guests will I be asked to leave? Advice please, cause I think myself and my husband fancy a swim on the West Coast this weekend!!
Submitted by BU Commenter Sundowner
Barbados has now lost its island appeal to locals and tourists alike. More significantly the pedestrian trails which provided access to local beaches have been excavated to be replaced by concrete or locked gates. The prophetic words in the song Jack which the Mighty Gabby made famous in 1982 have come to past (please go to the nearest record shop and buy this CD).
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67 responses to “Unbridled tourism development in Barbados”
Terence Blackett
BARBADOS GOV* READY 4 A CRYPTO WORLD??? WHO WILL BE AMONG THE 1ST MILLIONAIRES OR BILLIONAIRES?
#DontGetLeftBehind
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Cuhdear Bajan
@NorthernObserver January 23, 2025 at 2:49 pm ““Highlighting some of the benefits of the project, Duguid told the House that the inland relocation was a safer alternative to safeguard the facilities from the constant flooding in the area. He also noted that the centre was constrained by its lack of space and thus limited in its expansion.” So the Hotel is to built on stilts?
And they cannot add an extra floor to the existing structures?
What about all the flood mitigation work done?
My response: It is true that parking at the civic center is very difficult. I go there from time to time to renew my driver’s licence, pay taxes, use the library. When going to the library I always have the young grands with me. Often I have to park in the Massy lot on the land side and walk a distance with a baby/toddler. Not impossible, but moderately difficult. If a new library is built, will they please add a ground floor accessible to people carrying young children, wheelchair users and the elderly. The present library is up a steep flight of stairs.
@NorthernObserver January 23, 2025 at 2:49 pm So the Hotel is to built on stilts?
I presume that if an entity is building on the west coast they have nuff, nuff money, that said, if the hotel funders are wise, yes, they will build on stilts, and they will do extensive flood mitigation work. Between my father and his mother they knew Barbados from 1879 to 2006 [and stories from their parents and grand parents before that] since they both lived to be very old and kept in their right minds until the last few months of their lives. They have seen flood events that we current Bajans know too little about. Once, more than 40 years ago I wanted to buy some land on the west coast when west coast land was still accessible to ordinary working class Bajans and my father told me “leave that to the rich people, they will have the money to handle the flooding when it comes.”
Because flooding can come from the west, that is from storm surge and sea level rise [ask the Beryl fishermen about this] and from the east, since much of the water from inland Barbados flows to the storied “platinum” coast and then into the sea. All rivers, even “dry” rivers flow into the sea. And Barbados is full of “dry rivers” which become torrents when there are 6 to 8 inch rainfalls in a few hours. A little boy from my gap, a CP student was caught in such at Gibbes some years ago. He had been living with his grandparents while his parents worked in the USA. Within a short period his worried parents sent for him.
Another piece of old man wisdom. When you are looking to buy a house or a piece of land, and this applies to anywhere in the world, please take a look at in the in the worse possible weather. If you can’t get there and back easily and safely, how are you going to manage for the rest of your life? But of course we human beings look to look at nice and pretty. We don’t like to move about when there are fires, floods, volcanoes or extreme snowfalls.
The beaches on the West Coast have deteriorated in recent years. It is a wait and see how Coastal Development interventions help to improve the problem. Nature can be unforgiving.
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TLSN
“Nature can be unforgiving”. Why are you pussy footing around with words. The pencil width beaches along the west coast have at best a quarter of a century life expectancy.
Those beaches should never have been built on. Oh, and as for the Hole Town lagoon, what a disaster.
In the years to come the whole of Barbados will resemble Mexico City covered in concrete and devoid of green spaces.
LAST YEAR, CRUISE calls at the Bridgetown Port eclipsed the 2023 numbers.
However, while chief executive officer at the Barbados Tourism Marketing Inc. (BTMI) Andrea Franklin was pleased with the growth, she acknowledged that the market was competitive and that they would have to continue working to encourage more visitor spending.
“The continued growth of Barbados cruise tourism underscores our prominence as the premier home port in the southern Caribbean; servicing both contemporary and luxury vessels. Between January and November last year, we recorded 360 cruise calls, an increase of 61 calls compared to the same period in 2023 which had 299 calls.
“This 20 per cent growth reaffirms our commitment to providing world-class services to cruise lines and passengers alike,” she said.
Franklin made those comments yesterday during a ceremony to celebrate the inaugural arrival of P& O’s Iona.
During a follow-up interview with reporters, Franklin said additional calls were expected in the next season.
“Right now we anticipate about seven additional calls for the 2025-2026 winter season, based on what we currently have on schedule. That may change during the year as the ships make tweaks to their schedules,” she added.
In response to queries about what was being done to ensure the visitors spent money after leaving the ships, she said they were working with tour companies and taxi operators.
She also said they were pushing to make sure nontraditional attractions received more patronage.
“As much as possible we try to ensure that the tours are available for sale on the vessels. In large part that is based on the tours we have contracted with the lines, but it’s also about trying to work with our taxi operators, and the port to build out bespoke tours that they can also sell to individual cruisers who may not have booked on-board.
“There are other additional attractions that are not a part of those itineraries that we get persons to start sharing and getting persons to those locations. We’re working with the taxi operators to see how best we can create additional tours to the destination.
“We’re doing additional training with them, helping them to encourage persons to see other parts of the island by taking them to areas that might not be in tour schedules,” she said. While referencing the growth in visitor arrivals via air, Franklin said the agency would not rest on its laurels.
“We continue to work hard in all of our markets. We also will not sit and expect that it is natural. We know we have to work for it. The competition is there and we will continue to offer new ways of marketing the island, working with our local stakeholders to make sure we get persons interested, promote our festivals, events . . . to get persons interested in Barbados,” she said.
When Iona docked in the port yesterday, it was carrying more than 5 000 passengers who had embarked on a 35-night Caribbean cruise from Southampton.
Captain Andrew Wolverson said they were excited to be in Barbados.
“This is a fantastic opportunity for us to be able to bring Iona which is the first of our Excel-class ships to Barbados. It is a true favourite of ours. We look forward to doing this again in the future. This is probably the jewel of the crown.
“Our guests are incredibly excited to get off and explore. I imagine they are already on their way to the beach to enjoy everything and spend a lot of money,” Wolverson said. (TG)
CLIMATE CHANGE is a big threat to jobs in Barbados and the Caribbean, especially tourismrelated employment.
That warning comes from the International Labour Organisation (ILO), which is urging the region to take major action on climate change resilience and adaptation “to counter the short and long term climatic impacts on employment and livelihoods in the Caribbean”.
“Social protection systems that are integrated into the national climate resilience strategies of Caribbean countries are imperative to mitigate the livelihood impact on workers in the tourism sector and on all those affected by climate-related shocks,” the ILO advises in the World Employment And Social Outlook: Trends 2025.
The climate change threat to Caribbean jobs, especially tourism industry employment, is was reinforced in a related podcast in the organisation’s The Future Of Work series.
Featured expert Ekkehard Ernst, chief of the macroeconomic policies and jobs unit in the ILO’s research department, flagged climate change as one of the key factors impacting global labour markets.
He said this was the case for low income countries especially, but relevant for all countries.
“Over time, the damage that climate change is producing is going up. Most low-income countries do not have the capacity to protect themselves. They do not have the capacity to compensate for the damage that is being caused,” he said.
“As these costs grow up, these countries suffer more and more. Their infrastructure gets deteriorated. All these factors that would help them to develop and grow are actually being undermined by climate change.”
Negative effects
The new ILO report stressed how reliant the Caribbean was on tourism employment and the industry’s exposure to climate change.
“Estimates suggest that more than 40 per cent of total employment in the Caribbean is related to the tourism sector, which is highly vulnerable to climate-related shocks,” said the ILO. “Tourism is estimated to contribute nearly 33 per cent of GDP in the Caribbean, to directly account for around 18 per cent of all employment there, and to be indirectly linked to 43.1 per cent of total employment.” It added: “These estimates suggest that in total around 413 000 people in the Caribbean are directly employed in the tourism sector, and that employment in the sector reaches nearly one million when both direct and indirect employment are included.”
In its examination of climaterelated risks and the Caribbean tourism industry, the ILO recommendations action to counter climate change’s negative effects on the regional labour market.
While suggesting that social protection systems be integrated into the national climate resilience strategies of Caribbean countries, the report said that “funding gaps in such systems need to be bolstered by multilateral funds and international donors”.
“As the Caribbean contributes relatively little greenhouse gas emissions but are disproportionately affected by climate change, certain measures should be established to offset this imbalance – under the notion of ‘climate justice’,” the ILO urged.
“These include climate finance from developed countries to help build climate resilience, such as through multilateral climate funds like the Green Climate Fund Adaptation Fund. Additionally, and especially with the elevated levels of public debt in the Caribbean, debt-forclimate swaps – a form of debt relief in return for implementing climate resilience measures – could also be explored,” it recommended.
Elaborating on the predicted climate change impacts on tourism, the report observed that “some estimates suggest that coastal erosion from rising sea levels could contribute to a reduction of nearly 50 per cent of direct tourism revenue”.
“The COVID-19 pandemic also provided an insight into the impact of a major disruption of the tourism industry on livelihoods in the Caribbean. Estimates suggest that around 70 per cent of hotels laid off employees and more than half cut salaries,” it stated.
“The impact on employment is broader when one considers the indirect impacts on the broader service sector as well as the climate impacts on agriculture. During the pandemic, the Caribbean economies were able to contain job losses through stimulus packages and relief measures.”
The United Nations agency noted, however, that “with the longer-term impacts of climate-related shocks, such measures are less feasible; what is required instead is significant investment and action at the global level on climate change adaptation and resilience”.
Source: Nation
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TLSN
Mark Maloney certainly has a miraculous business history. He dabbled in becoming Barbados principal big shot covid-19 purchaser. Prior to this he developed the Coverley village.
His ambition remains undiminished. It looks like he has found a new pet project to dabble with and keep him occupied. Check the link below. The government of Barbados appears to have fallen in love with this handsome young man.
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