PM wants more greening in tourism

by Marlon Madden

Prime Minister Mia Mottley is calling for greater conservation and better environmental practices in the island’s tourism sector as the country aims for a more sustainable tourism product.
Reaffirming her administration’s commitment to the development of the tourism and hospitality sector, Mottley said the island had an obligation to “get it right” in order to become more sustainable.

“As a mature tourism destination Barbados more than most has an obligation on it to be able to see where we are getting it right and where we need to improve in order to meet the new world in which we have been catapulted,” she said.

Pointing out that the pandemic has caused households, industries and governments to pivot in an effort to survive and remain relevant, she said “we now live in a world where much of what we do in tourism has equally to change”.

“Whether it is from the perspective of ensuring that we green our properties and ensure our scarce access to water is continually managed appropriately, or whether it is in terms of ensuring that we minimise the down period as it relates to any climatic events.

“So that the greening of our tourism product and the sustainability of our tourism product becomes absolutely essential, because traditionally we have been accustomed to being able to extend at all cost, clean towels, new towels, new sheets, all kinds of things as if the experience was one that was reliant on an unlimited supply of resources, which we all know now is not,” said Mottley.

She was addressing the recent renaming of the island’s premier hospitality institute, which is now named the Jean and Norma Holder Hospitality Institute and Hotel PomMarine.
Mottley told the intimate gathering that training will play a critical role in the continued development and sustainability of the sector.

She said: “if ever there was a time to repurpose and re-imagine and recreate it is absolutely now.
If ever we intend to do any of those things it is not just a matter of public policy, but it is fundamentally a matter of training and development.”

She also called for “deepening” of language studies within the hospitality institute, stressing the importance of those in the industry being able to effectively function whether home or abroad.

I would like to ensure that it is deepened because the opportunities for example for Barbadian hotel and hospitality workers to work in the Americas must not be limited by the absence of capacity to speak fluently in the country they may find opportunities,” she said.
marlonmadden@barbadostoday.bb