News Releases

Tourism Minister urges businesses to embed community development in their operations as Sandals Foundation brings Island Challenge home KINGSTON, Jamaica; Friday, August 14, 2026: Minister of Tourism, Hon. Edmund Bartlett, is calling for a fundamental redefinition of corporate social responsibility (CSR) in Jamaica’s tourism industry, urging businesses to move beyond charitable giving and become more deeply embedded in the development and resilience of the communities in which they operate. Minister Bartlett made the call on Tuesday (August 11) while delivering the main address at the launch of the Sandals Foundation Island Challenge Jamaica 2026, under the theme “Tourism Doing Good,” at the AC Marriott Hotel in Kingston. The four-day endurance event, scheduled for October 2–5, will take approximately 30 UK athletes, along with local and international partners, on a route spanning Trelawny, St. Ann, St. Mary and St. Andrew. Participants will run, kayak, trek and hike across Jamaica’s landscapes while seeking to raise £100,000 to strengthen neonatal and paediatric healthcare services, including at the Falmouth Public General Hospital.

TORONTO, Canada; July 31, 2026 – Jamaica's Minister of Tourism, Hon. Edmund Bartlett has put plainly that the financing of resilience building is critical to protecting the livelihoods of tourism dependent countries and, ultimately, the future of tourism. In supporting resilience building in a real sense, destinations will be able to better prepare for, respond to, and recover from increasingly complex global crises, warning that the world has entered a new ‘Age of Resilience.’ Delivering the keynote address at the Canadian-Caribbean Tourism Resilience Symposium, Minister Bartlett said tourism must move beyond traditional recovery efforts and embrace a new model centred on anticipation, adaptation and inclusive financing. “The world has changed. Tourism must change with it,” Minister Bartlett declared. “We must move from reaction to anticipation, from vulnerability to transformation, from fragmented recovery to shared resilience,” he added.

KINGSTON, Jamaica; Monday, July 27, 2026: Minister of Tourism, Hon. Edmund Bartlett, will depart the island later today for Toronto, Canada, where he will serve as keynote speaker at the Canadian–Caribbean Tourism Resilience Symposium: Co-Designing the Next Decade, being hosted by George Brown Polytechnic’s Global Tourism Resilience and Crisis Management Centre (GTRCMC) from July 29-30, 2026. The symposium will convene senior government officials, international tourism leaders, academics, policymakers and private sector stakeholders from Canada and the Caribbean to examine the future of tourism through the lenses of resilience, innovation, sustainability and strategic partnership. Discussions will focus on strengthening tourism systems, advancing climate resilience, harnessing artificial intelligence and digital transformation, and fostering greater collaboration between the two regions.

MONTEGO BAY, Jamaica; Tuesday, July 21, 2026: Minister of Tourism, Hon. Edmund Bartlett, has signalled a new era of closer collaboration between the Ministry of Tourism, its public bodies and the Jamaica Hotel and Tourist Association (JHTA), following an inaugural strategic meeting with the Association’s newly elected executive at the Montego Bay Convention Centre on Thursday, July 16. The meeting, held three weeks after O’Brian Heron was elected JHTA president, focused on strengthening public-private sector cooperation as Jamaica advances its Tourism 3.0 agenda and continues recovering from the effects of Hurricane Melissa. Congratulating Mr. Heron on what he described as “a very emphatic victory,” Minister Bartlett reaffirmed the Government’s commitment to maintaining the JHTA as a central partner in tourism governance, noting that the proposed establishment of the Tourism Authority is intended to strengthen, not diminish, the Association’s role.

MONTEGO BAY, Jamaica; Friday, July 17, 2026: Community tourism is being positioned to play a leading role in driving Jamaica’s Local First policy direction under the Ministry of Tourism’s new Tourism 3.0 growth strategy but Minister of Tourism, Hon. Edmund Bartlett says there has to be a strategic shift from being a country of samples to one of ample. “Tourism is nothing but community; it’s everything we do in the community that creates the experiences that give people the desire to return,” he posited while underscoring that the real wealth of tourism is to be found in meeting the supply needs. “We the people of Jamaica must own and in fact direct the supply side of tourism,” Bartlett asserted, noting that, “It is about us building out communities, so we have to build out our farming districts, our fishing villages, our heritage towns, maroon communities, cultural corridors all across the country.”

Tourism Minister Calls for Caribbean “Co-petition” to Drive Next Era of Tourism Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic; Thursday, July 2, 2026: “The future of tourism will be defined not by the number of visitors destinations attract, but by the value tourism creates for their people,” Jamaica’s Minister of Tourism, Hon. Edmund Bartlett, declared today as he unveiled Jamaica’s Tourism 3.0 Framework at the Americas Investment Forum 2026. Speaking during the leadership panel on “Building a Regionally Integrated Tourism Strategy,” Minister Bartlett said the global tourism industry is entering a new competitive era where destinations succeed by combining resilience, innovation, skilled people, seamless visitor experiences and strong governance to create sustainable economic value. “Jamaica’s Tourism 3.0 Framework recognises that the future of tourism is not simply about growing visitor arrivals, but about growing the value tourism creates for workers, businesses, communities and the wider economy,” Bartlett said. “The destinations that will lead tomorrow are those that invest not only in hotels, but in people, partnerships, productivity, resilience and trust,” he added.