It was a time of celebration for the Barbados delegation at last week’s World Travel Market (WTM) in London as both Kerrie Symmonds, Minister of Tourism and International Transport, and destination Barbados were recognized at the leading global event for the travel industry.
Top UK tour operator, Virgin Holidays, issued the ‘Everyone Can Take on The World’ award to Symmonds for his promotion of a policy of diversity and inclusiveness in Caribbean tourism.
The award came following a commitment the Minister made recently during his speech at the opening ceremony of a Virgin Holidays sponsored training course for hospitality workers in Barbados. There he stated that “the image of discrimination and undesirability surrounding the region’s treatment of persons with disabilities and same sex preferences respectively, has to come to an end and my policy is that Barbados must lead by example in order to ensure that the change is tangible and that the process of change is expedited.”
Destination Barbados also shone bright, celebrated as the best destination for weddings and honeymoons at the Selling Travel Agents Choice Awards, beating Mauritius to the top spot as voted for by thousands of UK travel agents.
‘Year of Wellness and Soft Adventure’ at Barbados booth
Both accolades came against the backdrop of Barbados’ stunning interactive booth at WTM, where approximately 100 meetings were held with key buyers.
Once again, the booth was designed and constructed to showcase the culture and diversity of the destination to the travel industry. During the conference, the BTMI unveiled its new marketing focus for 2019 – the ‘Year of Wellness and Soft Adventure’. The theme was brought to life through healthy juices mixed by ‘blender bicycle’ on the stand itself, and served to guests at the Wellness Bar; a daily Wellness Hour with chef Michael Harrison serving Barbadian cuisine and a range of teas; masseuses on hand to help visitors relax after a hard day’s work; video content promoting Barbados’ soft adventure highlights; and even Virtual Reality headsets to bring the Barbados experience to life.
Symmonds said he was delighted with the outcome for Barbados at his first WTM show. “Visitors from the UK are tracking to be their highest ever in 2018, so it was very important that we came to London with a strong invitation to our partners here to work even more with us next year to break that record again,” he said.
“I have also been honoured to collect two awards for Barbados while I have been here, showing once more how highly esteemed our island is in the UK. It has been impressive and encouraging to see the delegation working so hard this last three days and I think we have every reason to look forward to 2019 with optimism.” (PR)
Congratulations, Kerry!
I kinda prefer “Destination Barbados” more so than “Brand Barbados”. The former tends to be more traveler-driven. The latter sounds like something for local consumption.
Let’s start assessing the success of our tourism based on “visitor spend”, rather than the traditional visitor arrivals.
No longer can Barbados afford to have visitors come to Barbados and enjoy the resources, damage the infrastructure and pollute the environment, without offloading lots of dollars on the island.
So Symmonds must go after those high net worth big spenders to boost the foreign reserves and breathe new life into the tourist industry.
That belongs to Richard Sealy.
Awesome !, Classy ! and that’s what I like to see . . . . now this is Barbados , The Gem of the Caribbean.
Thought they were having a feast at taxpayers expense then realized there is no food on the table.
What exactly is intended when someone speaks of changing the image of discrimination against SAME SEX and Barbados leading the change?
As far as I know Barbados does not discriminate against person who have same sex attractions or even who are practicing that lifestyle.
Does he mean that Barbados is going to be the first English speaking Caribbean country to recognise and legalise same sex ‘marriage’?
@John Carter
Does he mean that Barbados is going to be the first English speaking Caribbean country to recognise and legalise same sex ‘marriage’?
The answer is YES. The crooked Barbados Labour Party has tried to push legislation through Parliament before relating to gay rights during the Arthur time, in the dead of night I remember.
Judging from the number of L G B T supporters the party featured on its political platforms during the general elections campaign, Barbados is in for a rude awakening. Gay rights and marriage is sitting on our doorsteps. They are waiting to flood this islands by the cruise ship loads. Kerrie Symmonds is steadily preparing the pathway, for he sees tourism success in their numbers.
@John Carter
Does he mean that Barbados is going to be the first English speaking Caribbean country to recognise and legalise same sex ‘marriage’?
The answer is YES. The crooked Barbados Labour Party has tried to push legislation through Parliament before relating to g a y rights during the Arthur time, in the dead of night I remember.
Judging from the number of “LgBt” supporters the party featured on its political platforms during the general elections campaign, Barbados is in for a rude awakening. Girlie rights and weirdo marriage is sitting on our doorsteps. They are waiting to flood
this island with the numbers on the cruise liners, which Kerrie Symmonds will see as a tourism success.
this islands by the cruise ship loads. Kerrie Symmonds is
steadily preparing the pathway, for he sees tourism success in
their numbers.
There are certain code words that this Akismet system is programmed to block on this website. This German device is pretty good at throwing some of your comments into the scam heap.
@Johnny Crow: “The crooked Barbados Labour Party….”
Do you know if any “crooked” person has been/will be sent to prison for alleged “false invoicing” $3.3 million “that was paid to [Leroy] Parris”, as stated in another section of the Press last Sunday?
It was reported that the judicial manager alleged it was “false invoicing issued by late Prime Minister David Thompson.”
What say ye?
I say investigate the Al Barrack issue and who are the people who divided the $150 million dollar payout he got. Who was the man sitting behind the wheel when that building was built, and who is the main man looking after land and housing now.
$!50 million Carl that needs to be investigated.
Is that an accomplishment
After all we have had a Visible and exorbitant tourist board in London for over fifty years
Shiver me timbers
@Johnny Crow
Barbados is a nation of laws. If there is solid evidence of wrongdoing, take it to court. What we do know, that you refuse to comment on, is your guy Thompson was reportedly found guilty of “false invoicing “ in a court of law.
Then there is the former Speaker of the House shafting an elderly wheelchair-bound man of nearly $225,000. The court acted decisively in making him make restitution to the senior citizen.
Donville Inniss now sits in the United States awaiting trial on bribery and money laundering charges with an ankle-monitoring bracelet, unable to return to the land of his birth anytime soon.
The siblings were right to insist that the ill-gotten monies placed on their mother’s bank account by a shady brother was divided equally among them following the death of the family matriarch.
Hope that details of the MOU for a massive tourism project that was signed early on Saturday morning at a St Michael home would soon be made available to the public. May all those associated with it Rest In Peace. Wonder how some people will continue to get their regular payouts.
We have to wait and see if the BWA, acting on the directions of former Minister Dr Estwick, awarding a 5.2 million-dollar to a newly formed company, over two long-established local entities to supply pipes and fittings that tendered around $1.5 million, will make it to the law courts.
No one can tell if former DLP ministers are venturing as far as Culpepper Island or even offshore in a fishing boat for fear of being arrested by US officials. I certainly did not see any on my recent flights from London to Barbados and then to New York.
Tell me who is “crooked” again? Cannnnnn’t hear you!
@Carl Harper
The crooked BLP has won all the seats in Parliament, the DEMS are not in charge anymore. Your vicious MPs should stop threatening people, and take matters of theft to court. If you have the evidence do your thing, just don’t lay accusations against someone to impress the public, but bring no proof. The BLP seems to be experts at smear. All we’re getting is bluff, bluff ,bluff. I mentioned the Al Barrack issue to you Carl, and you scoff at it, when the man who was the Minister under which that scheme occurred, holds a similar position in the present government. Not only that, his name is being banded about on social media relating to land fraud. These are not good matters to have hanging over ones head and you are part of government.What the crooked BLP needs to do, is make sure that they come squeaky clean and straight (pun intended), because we watching and with the eyes of a hawk.
@Johnny Crow
You’re just repeating yourself and adding nothing new. Have a great day.
Carl the johnny cannot dispute anything you have said talking about smearing that is amazing coming frm a Dem.Crow seems to have forgotten the cuss fest at Waterford where they cuss Ms Mottley all night and then got throw out of the Parliament.
A Grass Hopper Politician reaping the Fruits of Richard Sealy Labour and taking the Credit