KINGSTON, Jamaica; May 17; 2018:   Tourism Minister, Hon. Edmund Bartlett says Jamaica’s Tourism Linkages Network received positive feedback during the 9th Asian Leadership Conference (ALC), being hosted at the Walkerhill Hotel, in South Korea.

The Minister noted that questions were posed by Asian delegates about work being done by the network.

“When I was invited to speak at the ALC, I knew there was particular interest in the many innovative initiatives we are doing locally to drive the economy through Tourism. They were particularly interested in the Linkages Network, and the targeted approach it is taking to improve the tourism product and the economy.

“The key goal of the network is to encourage buying local and thereby retaining foreign exchange spending. We are continuing our push to move from 30 cents on the dollar to 50cents,” said the Minister.

He further stated that “In Jamaica, we recognize that leakage is a major obstacle to sustainable tourism growth in Jamaica. It prevents money from flowing back into the local economy and benefiting the people of the country. The Linkages Network with its numerous ground-breaking initiatives was created to address this concern.”

The Minister also discussed the need to provide much needed assistance to Small and Medium Tourism Enterprises across the world.

“I presented the delegates with our concept paper entitled ‘The Global Mainstreaming of Small and Medium-Sized Tourism Enterprises’.  It encourages leaders to revisit our strategies for supporting the expansion and improvement of this critical sector of the tourism market. I am hoping this will help to change the perceptions of this key group,” said Minister Bartlett.

The Minister will also participate as a panellist at the United Nations World Tourism Organization/PATA Leaders Debate on Saturday, May 19 in Gangneung.

While there, he will share his insights on the current challenges being faced by the travel and tourism industry. He will also use the opportunity to discuss airlift issues and will speak on the Global Centre for Tourism Resilience and Crisis Management.

The Minister is accompanied by his Senior Advisor/Consultant, Dr Lloyd Waller, and his Executive Assistant, Anna-Kay Newell. The team is expected to return to the island on Monday, May 21.

MONTEGO BAY, Jamaica; Wednesday, May 16, 2018: Acknowledged as the leader in tourism innovation in the Caribbean, Jamaica is now set to embark on the road to becoming a smart destination.

Speaking at the Smart Destination Workshop 2018 last Friday, Minister of Tourism, Hon. Edmund Bartlett disclosed that the Ministry had invested J$30 million in the development of the fully integrated website that has been developed in conjunction with Google and will be launched in June.

“That’s the game-changer that we’ve been looking for to enable a platform in which all players can now come and populate with their content,” said Minister Bartlett.

He was particularly pleased that this would now allow for small vendors, classified as small and medium tourism enterprises, to have access. “The big word for us in smart tourism is access and Jamaica will provide access for visitors from all over the world,” said Minister Bartlett.

Minister Bartlett saw the coming together of public and private sector entities to demonstrate the use of technology in the forward thrust to grow tourism, as “a phenomenal development and it is putting Jamaica at the cutting edge of the new tourism.” He posited that “it is going to enable us to be sustainable in terms of our development process.”

He regarded the workshop as “being central in terms of creating and mapping out this new architecture for tourism” and advocated having this forum more often than once a year.

Mr. Bartlett underlined that “the change that is taking place in tourism today is absolutely mind boggling and destinations are undergoing a level of metamorphosis that is faster than even they can recognize themselves.” He said the change was coming because of “the fourth revolution” which he defined as “the huge influx of cognitive systems that are redefining the way things are done, adding value to innovation.”

Minister Bartlett issued a call “to wake up” and realize that tourism was now a brand new mega global industry with a value of US$8 trillion, representing ten percent of global GDP, second only to the financial services at 19 percent, and employing 400 million people last year. Tourism also accounted for 30 percent of trading services worldwide.

Darragh Fitzgerald Selby, Chairman of the Knowledge Network, one of the five pillars of the Ministry of Tourism’s Linkages Network, said Jamaica was being positioned to be seen as the knowledge centre of the Caribbean.

The stage for the Smart Destination workshop was set last year July when the Ministry of Tourism partnered with Digicel Business to introduce the concept of smart destination stakeholders, continued today with a workshop at the Montego Bay Convention Centre looking at implementation of the concept.

In addition to Digicel Business, Smart Destination 2018 is supported by technology giants AVAYA, ARUBA and TREND, as well as Exim Bank and the Jamaica Hotel and Tourist Association.

KINGSTON, Jamaica; Wednesday, May 16, 2018: Speaking at the 9th Asian Leadership Conference on Globalisation in Crisis: Navigating the World with New Opportunities in Seoul, South Korea, Min the Hon Edmund Bartlett called for the need for a 'Holistic Sustainable Tourism Roadmap for Asia'.

Recognising the growing and future potential of the region, especially with the potential unification of North and South Korea, the growing economies of Indonesia, India and China Minister Bartlett said that Asia will soon become one of the desired tourism destination for many and, a major source market for various other destinations. According to Bartlett, this will be "a game-changer, not only for the Asian region but for countries like Jamaica who will need to prepare for the influx of curious travellers from Asia".

Bartlett stated that the Asian region will need to work with existing stakeholders such as PATA and the UNWTO to enhance their existing products and services and, to develop new products and services in the region to attract the transitioning travellers. He further stated that there will be a need for travel authorities in the region to manage both inbound and outbound travel, while importantly protecting against harm to the environment and effectively safeguarding heritage spaces.

According to Mr. Bartlett, the recently developed Global Tourism Resilience and Crisis Centre housed at the University of the West Indies will play an important role in the upcoming transition of the Asian region in terms of research, monitoring and evolution as well as training and capacity building and advice.

The Minister travels to Gangneung to participate in the PATA Annual Summit (PAS). He will participate as a panellist at the United Nations World Tourism Organization/PATA Leaders Debate on Saturday, May 19. High on the agenda are discussions regarding the implications of the North South Korean unification for travel and tourism in the region and further implications for the world.

Bartlett is accompanied by Dr Lloyd Waller, senior advisor/consultant and Anna-Kay Newell, Executive Assistant to the Minister. The team is expected to return to the island next Monday.

KINGSTON, Jamaica, Tuesday, May 15, 2018: The Ministry of Tourism has restructured some of its key agencies to meet changing demands of the global tourism markets.

Outlining “a new architecture to meet tourism demands,” in his 2018 Sectoral presentation to Parliament recently, Minister of Tourism, Hon Edmund Bartlett said  the ministry recognized the importance of linkages and the more critical impact of the supply side of the industry.

Explaining the emerging new architecture in the industry, Minister Bartlett said tourism was becoming much like commodities, driven by price and demand, and in some instances price and value. He said new business models were emerging “that change the way in which we do business normally.”

Noting that there was a high level of integration, he said the Tourism Ministry recognized that putting in place the infrastructure required to meet the changing demands of tourists was required “to enable cost effectiveness and competitive pricing.”

Among the agencies that have undergone changes is the Jamaica Tourist Board which has been re-engineered and will change its methods of marketing and promoting of ‘Destination Jamaica’, to meet the needs of emerging tourism source markets globally.

Minister Bartlett said to compete in the new global marketplace, the JTB’s number one strategy would be development of a new, fully integrated website revolving on a single axis and providing non-stop global access to the destination. It will be integrated with Google and eventually linked into Airbnb’s platform with four million members.

The new website will host and promote all aspects of the destination and provide real time access and content to tour more than 50,000 travel agents globally allowing for more efficiency in selling Jamaica. “We will be able to perform, manage and incentivize them remotely to maximize our room and airline capacity,” and get more value from advertising and promotions, he noted.

Also changing focus after 14 years is the Tourism Enhancement Fund (TEF). In keeping with changes in global tourism, Mr. Bartlett said there was a need to reposition and diversify tourism products to make them more innovative and attractive to tourists. Consequently, as of April 1 this year, the TEF business model was restructured to focus on developing innovative projects and enabling iconic attractions across the island.

Since its inception, TEF has been focusing largely on projects and Minister Bartlett gave an assurance that it would continue its role of ensuring destination enhancement by building out the physical infrastructure.

However, going forward, TEF would be providing entrepreneurs, particularly those interested in small and medium tourism enterprises, with information to modify their business models as needed, to adapt to new trends in the industry and by extension keep their businesses afloat.

TEF is also being expanded to include new divisions such as the Tourism Linkages Network, the Jamaica Centre of Tourism Innovation (JCTI) and the Craft Development Institute.

A third major shift in the restructuring of the Tourism Ministry, has been the inclusion of cruise to the portfolio of Jamaica Vacations (JamVac) to create better relationships with cruise lines and include shore experience personnel.

Minister Bartlett said JamVac was now positioned to have greater monitoring of the shore experience to ensure early response to challenges while working with agencies such as the Port Authority of Jamaica (PAJ), Tourism Product Development Company (TPDCo) and local stakeholders to remedy any challenges. He reported that JamVac had been influential in ensuring that the perceived harassment at ports was minimized along with help of government and private stakeholders. 

KINGSTON, Jamaica, Monday May 14, 2018: Tourism continues to experience unprecedented growth as the industry plays a lead role in the government’s growth agenda. With three years into a five-year expansion plan set by Tourism Minister, Hon Edmund Bartlett, projections are being exceeded.

Following a record-breaking season in 2017, Minister Bartlett reported to Parliament in his 2018 sectoral presentation recently, that tourism numbers for the first quarter of this year had hit new highs with January to March arrivals of 1,298,674, representing an increase of 6.6 percent over the corresponding period last year.

The 625,002 stopovers and 673, 672 cruise passengers meant the island had over 80,000 more visitors for the period. Gross estimated foreign exchange earnings for the quarter stood at US$825.3million, an increase of 8.5 percent.

“The rapidly expanding tourism sector has maintained its position as one of the main contributors to job creation, investments and foreign revenues in the economy over the last several decades,” said Minister Bartlett in his report, with data indicating that the total economic impact of the sector surpassed most other segments of the economy.

Underscoring the fact that tourism was vital to the fulfilment of the mandate of Vision 2030 – making Jamaica the place to live, work, raise families and do business – Mr. Bartlett outlined that the industry was a major contributor to tax revenues and employment creation.

Pursuing new investments, Mr. Bartlett said over 1,200 rooms were added to the country’s hotel stock in 2017 totalling millions of US dollars. For 2018/2019, an additional 1000 rooms are to be added.

Cruise tourism has also been growing apace, putting Jamaica on a trajectory to becoming the leading cruise destination in the Caribbean. Cruise passenger visits were 11 percent higher than in 2016 and gross earnings from that sub sector was US$179 million, up 19 percent from US$150 million in 2016.

Mr. Bartlett said strong growth was anticipated in 2018 owing to the wide range of cruise development initiatives that have been pursued with partners and stakeholders over the past year.

The Port Authority of Jamaica is overseeing the upgrade of ports to enhance capacity and receive large cruise ships. US$22 million is being spent on Reynolds Pier in Ocho Rios. It is being twinned with rehabilitation of the Ocho Rios Fishing Village at a cost of US$4.5 million to transform it into a modern complex for food, entertainment and vending.

The Falmouth port will be upgraded at a cost of US$3 million to allow two Oasis-class vessels to dock simultaneously. Minister Bartlett said there was a commitment to rehabilitate of the whole town of Falmouth to enhance the readiness of its infrastructure and allow residents to maximize the benefits of an expanded cruise tourism sector. Consequently, US$12.85 million had been earmarked a number of projects and upgrades, among them development of an Artisan Village at Hampden Wharf, renovation of Falmouth market, landscaping of Market Street and improvement of the Falmouth Hospital.

Plans are also being crafted for development of Port Royal to accommodate cruise tourism.

MONTEGO BAY, St. James; May 11, 2018:  Tourism Minister, Hon. Edmund Bartlett has tasked the Tourism Linkages Council to complete the tourism demand study by August this year.

“I have charged the Chairman of the Tourism Linkages Council, Adam Stewart, to complete a demand study that will facilitate quantitative analysis of the need for manufacturing and other goods and services within the sector,” Minister Bartlett said.

The study was designed to identify the existing/ potential demand in the tourism sector for goods and services across local sectors such as agriculture, manufacturing and entertainment.

The Minister, who was speaking at the Ministry of Tourism’s Smart Destination Workshop added that, “We will be going a step further to engage buyers, hoteliers and suppliers from all sectors at a summit in September. The aim of this summit will be to critically analyze and discuss the findings from the study with a view to charting the way forward.”

In his recent address to Parliament, Minister Bartlett emphasized the need to plug the leakages by strengthening the linkages between tourism and other sectors.

“My Ministry remains fully committed to changing the production and consumption patterns to facilitate a greater flow of wealth within the sector, especially among our small and medium sized tourism enterprises,” Minister Bartlett added.

There are opportunities for increased linkages with local suppliers to facilitate import substitution in producing various items. The aim of the Ministry of Tourism is to foster more purchasing of local goods and services which will reduce the imports and help to plug the leakages from importation.

KINGSTON, JAMAICA; Wednesday, May 9, 2018: Tourism workers are on the brink of benefitting from housing and pension funded by the Tourism Enhancement Fund (TEF) to the tune of $2 billion. The TEF has also earmarked another $1 billion for the National Solid Waste Management Authority (NSWMA).

Emphasising that housing as it related to tourism workers, “is key part of the concern for us in the Ministry,” Minister of Tourism, Hon. Edmund Bartlett said a recent survey indicated that “over 88 percent of the workers in the industry cannot even access NHT housing solutions.”

In his Sectoral presentation to Parliament yesterday, Mr. Bartlett announced that “We have put $1 billion, over the next five years, to assist tourism workers to access housing solutions through the Housing Agency of Jamaica (HAJ).”

TEF will make $170.7million available to support implementation of the first phase of the programme in this financial year.

The survey formed the basis of the development of a framework to support housing needs for tourism workers as a component of the Tourism Workers’ Welfare Programme. It also showed that while 94% of the workers contributed to the NHT, 85% did not own a home and would not be able to afford a house costing more than $2.5 million.

The discussion between TEF and the HAJ also included a number of other initiatives, such as developing parcels of land identified for housing for tourism workers and providing basic infrastructure for informal settlements in which a number of tourism workers reside.

Also, while seeking to ensure that workers in tourism have decent work, he said the Ministry of Tourism was also examining labour market arrangements aimed at ending the traditional seasonal arrangement “because the kind of volume that we are bringing in to Jamaica is not about seasonal employment, it’s 24/7 employment.”

Last year the industry brought in 4.3 million visitors and currently provided direct employment 122,500 workers.

In an update on the tourism workers’ pension scheme, Mr. Bartlett informed Parliament that it was on track. “I am pleased to say that the Chief Parliamentary Council (CPC) has now given us the draft so we are ready to come to Parliament with the Bill in the middle of the year and hopefully by October, we will have this revolutionary tourism pension plan for the people of this great industry,” he announced.

 A delay in the implementation of the pension scheme arose when it was determined that the Financial Services Commission (FSC) would have oversight but had no experience in giving oversight to a scheme driven by legislation. The FSC Act had to be amended to enable that happening.

 The pension scheme, which will be a compulsory contributory one, will cover all categories of tourism workers, with each beneficiary entitled to a pension of at least J$200,000 regardless of when they join.

 TEF is seeding the pension scheme with $1 billion over the first four years.

The other $1 billion will be going to the NSWMA to continue to carry its full programme of maintenance to keep the island clean.” Concurrently, ‘Spruce Up’ Jamaica will be spearheading the Ministry’s island wide communication message aimed at bringing awareness to all Jamaicans on the importance of tourism to the country.

MONTEGO BAY, Jamaica; Tuesday, May 1, 2018: Faced with the reality of the Caribbean being the most tourism-dependent region on earth, Minister of Tourism, Hon Edmund Bartlett has pointed regional commissioners of police to the need for an integrated approach to ensuring the safety and security of visitors.

Minister Bartlett was one of several speakers at yesterday’s opening ceremony of the 33^rd annual general meeting and conference of the Association of Caribbean Commissioners of Police, being held at the Montego Bay Convention Centre. He reminded them that tourism has been the single, most important and sustainable activity particularly within the Anglophobe Caribbean over the last 50 years.

Currently, the industry accounts for over 40 percent of the GDP of the Caribbean’s economy, employing one-in-five of all workers in the region and last year earning US$30 billion. “What it means then, is that the future of the economic well-being of our region is truly not locked into the traditional mode of production as we have understood it, nor is it tied to the traditional commodities that have characterised our economic community over time,” he said.

In line with the conference theme, “An Integrated Approach towards Serious and Organized Crime: Implications for regional Growth and development,” Mr. Bartlett told police commissioners and other representatives of 13 Caribbean states that “despite its importance and the fact that price was not yet a major factor, tourism was a vulnerable economic activity, susceptible to major disruptions of all types.” And while maintaining that the Caribbean remained a region of peace, he stressed that safety and security had to be seen as top priority as “the elements that are going to distinguish destinations in the future are safety, security and seamlessness.”

At the local level, the Ministry of Tourism, through the Tourism Enhancement Fund (TEF), has committed over J$1 billion to the Ministry of National Security to boost safety and security. Some $201 million has gone into rehabilitating police stations and other buildings, more than $191 million into purchasing motor vehicles and motor bikes to patrol resort areas and $45 million for the acquisition of boat engines and other equipment to support the Marine Resource Upgrading Programme.

Also, $80 million has been provided for the commissioning of CCTV systems and $150 million funded the training of 200 District Constables by the Tourism Product Development Company (TPDCo) to strengthen formal security arrangements in resort communities and tackle visitor harassment.

Also addressing the opening ceremony was Minister of National Security, Dr the Hon Horace Chang; Mayor of Montego Bay, Councillor Homer Davis; President, Association of Caribbean Commissioners,  Mr. Michael A. DeSilva; President, National Organisation of Black Law Enforcement Executives, Mr Clarence Cox and Commissioner of the Jamaica Constabulary Force,  Major General Antony Anderson.

The visitors were treated to the musical talents of the JCF Band, the JCF Choir and cultural items by 6-year-old Rhashaun Rhoden of DRB Grant Basic School and students of Herbert Morrison High School.