Take another look, Ministry of Tourism

THE EDITOR, Madam:

Television Jamaica’s ‘Bite of the Week’ during the Prime Time News on Friday, June 21, 2024, featured the classic case of a survival skill for Jamaicans ‘taking bad things mek laugh’.

This was aptly demonstrated by Heather Kuepper, manager of Chukka Tours, who coined a new definition for PHD – ‘Pot Hole Dodgers’ – in relation to her company’s drivers who have to navigate the challenging Jamaican road surfaces to commute overseas visitors to Chukka’s attractions.

Moving away from the ‘sun, sand and sea’ concept, Ms Kuepper took the bold move of integrating the realities of the local communities in her tourism product.

Joy Roberts, executive director of Jamaica Vacations (JamVac), is another keen tourism stakeholder. On Facebook, she shared the June 12-14, 2024, event emanating from the Florida-Caribbean Cruise Association (FCCA) and a number of member countries that established a task force.

“This resulted in a better understanding of the roles of the cruise lines and the destinations,” she said, noting that one outcome of this collaboration was the executives visiting local attractions to experience what their clients experience. Ms Roberts’ comments on TVJ news indicated the need for more varieties of attractions.

The issue of ‘over tourism’ versus ‘under tourism’, articulated in the Ministry of Tourism 2019 to 2022 Strategic Business Plan, is Strategy 7. The ministry’s Destination Marketing programme seeks to develop new tourism market segments to diversify the demographic, psychographic and socio-economic markets from which Jamaican tourists are traditionally drawn.

My suggestion towards this would be a call for the identification of tourism initiatives from non-traditional sources. This is reimagining new tourism markets where contenders would get a share of the pie. The Ministry of Tourism could start with historic educational institutions, where the majority are languishing for tourism attention.

This needs to be treated outside of the scope of a ‘call for project funding’, where there are more dogs than bones.

JOAN FRANCIS

Museum and Heritage Preservation Officer, UTech