The aviation consultant who ran the Grantley Adams International Airport until he was replaced by the Mia Mottley administration last September has declared that Barbados and the Caribbean will have to market themselves differently as tourist destinations.
Neville Boxhill, principal consultant at Kusafiri Consulting, said the Caribbean can no longer depend on festivals, conferences and events to lure visitors to its shores.
He said the change was necessary post-COVID-19, as the pandemic had changed the entire business of travel.
Appearing in a virtual conference hosted Wednesday by the Caribbean Tourism Organization on The Role of Regional Airlines and Airports in Boosting Intra-Regional Travel in Light of COVID-19. Boxhill said: “It would be appropriate that we look at how we can further develop our Caribbean tourism because the thing about Caribbean tourism is that it is heavily focused on events, conferences, business meetings; all things that have been severely impacted by COVID-19.
“So while we need to relook and refocus on Caribbean tourism, we also need to rethink the business model that we have been applying in the Caribbean for many, many years.
“Our tourism focus for many years has been focused on not the Caribbean necessarily as a leisure destination in the way that we focused on the US and the UK, but more event-driven such as festivals. We encouraged people to come for festivals, we encouraged people to come for conferences and business meetings.
“Now we’ve had COVID-19 and pretty much all of the festivals have been cancelled. People are now meeting via Zoom, conferences are being done via Zoom in order to avoid travel, so here in the Caribbean, we need to refocus on encouraging people to come to our islands from other islands for leisure.
“Some people may see that as a difficult sell but I do think that there is potential.”
The aviation expert also called for regional airlines to reduce some of their fees to encourage travel.
While acknowledging those airlines had taken a hit due to being closed for the past few months, he said high fees would deter intra-regional travel.
He said: “I think hotels need to really reassess, I think Caribbean Airlines and LIAT also need to reassess and see what their prices are, whether their fees are still appropriate in this environment and the attractions also need to reassess, because we are in unprecedented circumstances and what was your primary market four months ago is not your primary market today.”
In April 2018, Boxhill was appointed chief executive officer of the state-run airport in the final months of the Freundel Stuart administration. He had acted in the position since 2017.
Head of Sales at Caribbean Airlines Lisa Morales Wilson told the conference that airlines were in desperate need of money.
Just one day ago, Caribbean Airlines reported it had recorded a loss of more than $28 million (US$14 million) in one month as a result of the impact of COVID-19.
Wilson said while travellers expected lower fares, it was challenging to do so at this time.
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So-called “experts” with a degree and zero aviation experience should be the last — ESPECIALLY in aviation-contrary Barbados — to be offering opinions as to what should and should happen in aviation.
Barbados is THE PITS as far as aviation goes, its Category Two (unsafe) rating is justifiable ANY day of the year, and is well deserved by Barbados. The past DLP government raped every aspect of life in Barbados, and aviation was no exception. What was once a thriving Flying Club has been relegated to a usually deserted building and, within the Club, members are now being told they cannot bring visitors to the bar area and can themselves only be there at certain times.
Another reason for the Category Two (unsafe) ICAO/IASA rating is that the Civil Aviation Department comes under a Minister of government and is politically directed. ICAO/IASA requires that the Authority be independent in funding, operations and actions, while one limited-experience Air Traffic Controller after another is politically appointed as an (unqualified) Director.
Yet another reason for Category Two (unsafe) is that the CAD has been so robbed of funds and so many qualified people have left in disgust that there are no longer enough people in the entire Department to oversee the aircraft on the registry – which now includes a long range Boeing 747 the EC-CAA refused to register there, because their fully-manned office was not qualified to do provide the oversight.
In three years Queen Mia – who herself was almost killed by an Executive Air pilot’s gross misbehaviour before it ran out of fuel crossing the runway – has done nothing to help. But then she has done nothing to help the gross backlog of court cases, the gross inefficiency of civil servants dealing with the suffering public, and a list of other deficiencies which are at her fingertips with 100% of the seats in Parliament. As Queen of Barbados all she needed to do was say something, and it would have been done.
What feeds our tourism industry? Aviation, NOT ships. NOT cruisers. NOT yachts. But don’t mind my blatherings, you have “experts” to tell you what is wrong and what to do right, never mind they have NO experience in the field.
A Degree, like a Pilot Licence, is a paper qualification to go out into the real world and learn your profession. If you have instead hung out with politicians and kissed lying thieving backsides for the last 10 years then that is the profession you espouse, and you should keep on keeping on — because you have probably become a professional at doing so.
Somehow I think the BLP may switch PMs next election, but with the last GTLISS (Grand Theft Larceny, Incompetence and Sheer Stupidity) Administration the Party friends and protectors in the DLP will be sitting on the sidelines for years to come.