By Devon Evans, Gleaner WriterOCHO RIOS, St. Ann:
JAMAICA IS on target to achieve a 7 per cent increase in stopover visitors for calendar year 2003 over the 1.26 million stopover visitors recorded in 2002.
According to Paul Pennicooke, Director of Tourism, at the end of October Jamaica had already recorded a 6.4 per cent increase in stopover visitors, and with November and December looking promising, it was hopeful that the target would be achieved.
In an interview with The Gleaner at the Grand Sport Villas and Spa in Ocho Rios on Saturday night, Mr. Pennicooke said the Jamaica Tourist Board had set itself an additional target of a 7 per cent increase in 2004 over whatever is achieved this year.
He conceded that the target was ambitious, but that based on the forecast and reports from the marketplace, it might not be difficult to achieve. "We are setting those targets and we are hoping to achieve them", Mr. Pennicooke said. "As I said before, there is significantly increasing airlift coming in this winter, and the advance sales from the tour operators are very encouraging".
He said, however, that despite the encouraging signs there was much concern about the state of crime and violence in the country and the need for incidents of that nature to be either put under control or eliminated.
Crime and violence anywhere in Jamaica continued to perpetuate the perception in the major tourism marketplaces that the country was an unsafe destination, he said.
He added: "Whenever incidents happen that are reported abroad, not only do we lose from it in terms of the immediate fallout, but we lose a lot of business for the future".
Mr. Pennicooke continued, "We therefore are very concerned about that and the whole crime-and-violence situation needs to come under control. We need to bring that down as much as possible or, for that matter, eliminate it so that Jamaica can be seen as an extremely safe destination in our major markets, and we can see even better increases in our arrivals."
Asked to respond to suggestions by Gordon 'Butch' Stewart, Sandals' chairman, John Issa, Super Clubs' chairman, and Godfrey Dyer, Jamaica Hotel and Tourist Association president, that overseas help was needed to fight crime, Mr. Pennicooke said he too supported the suggestions. He, however, made it clear that the assistance being contemplated was not in terms of having foreign personnel on the streets, but that the assistance would be in the area of technical support and intelligence gathering.
