Caribbean News: Five on Friday June 17th, 2022

Jamaica welcomes million visitors since the start of the year

After years of disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic, the Jamaican tourism industry is bouncing back. Jamaica has welcomed millions of visitors since the start of the year, bringing earnings of US$1.5 billion. According to the Jamaican Tourism Minister, Edmund Bartlett a strong arrival shows that the tourism industry is recovering well, restoring its levels of arrivals and earnings in 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic. During the Jamaica 60 Diaspora Conference, Bartlett highlighted that this quick recovery is thanks to the contribution of the locals who helped to kick start the industry after the pandemic lockdown. Besides, the Tourism Minister noted how the diaspora continues to play an important role in the full recovery of the country. Bartlett insisted on calling the diaspora to return home to celebrate the Jamaican diamond Jubilee and make 2022 the best year for tourism recovery. In addition, Bartlett invited the diaspora to invest in the services and supplies that the tourism industry needs as the supply chain was disrupted during the COVID-19 pandemic. These disruptions present new opportunities for the diaspora.

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Travel Collaboration in the Caribbean Could Generate $100 Billion by 2032

According to the World Travel and Tourism Council, hereafter WTTC, the Caribbean’s travel, and tourism industries could generate more than $100 billion by 2032.

As the Caribbean has recorded the second-fastest recovery of all regions, over the next decade, the travel and tourism industry in the Caribbean could grow 6.7 percent annually and be worth 100 billion dollars by 2032, creating 1.3 million new jobs totaling 3.8 million people employed in the sector according to Julia Simpson, the president of WTTC. To achieve this long-term growth and sustained recovery, governments across the region must work together to focus on connectivity, sustainable infrastructure, and attracting investment. A stronger collaboration across the region, investment in infrastructure, and better air connectivity will be critical to its success. In addition to that, collaboration with the private sector and tourism industry organizations like the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association (CHTA) is essential to achieving this goal.

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Caribbean Film Festival To Celebrate The Pioneers Of The Windrush Generation

For the first time since its creation in 2020, the Windrush Caribbean Film Festival will celebrate the pioneers of the Windrush generation in person in cinemas. Under the theme “From Empire to Commonwealth: Legacies of the Windrush Generation”, the festival will celebrate the legacy of the Windrush generation on Black life and modern Britain. Online and in-person screenings will be held across cinemas from June 17 to July 17, 2022.

The festival will start at Riverfront, Wales From June 17 – 19, 2022. Then the festival moves to London. On June 22nd, it will be at the Prince Charles cinema, commencing on Windrush Day. On June 25th, the festival moves to the ‘home of Black Britain,’ Brixton, to screen the iconic film, ‘Pressure, Horace Ové,’ at the Ritzy Cinema. For the final outing in London, Genesis Cinema in East London hosts the festival on July 1st. Birmingham will then play host for the closing night on July 17th at the Midlands Arts Centre.

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From the Wreckage of Caribbean Migration, a New Kind of Beauty

Andil Gosine is a curator, artist, and professor, a descendant of migrants from South Asia in the Caribbean. He created the exhibition called “Everything Slackens in a Wreck” along with an international and multigenerational group of female artists of Asian-Caribbean origin. The exhibition introduces work that embodied the beauty of the complicated histories of immigration and cultural mixing in the Caribbean. The artists created stories of resilience from the traumatic histories of their ancestors. The work is on view at the Ford Foundation Gallery.

Andrea Chung’s “House of the Historians" (2022) presents a sculptural installation fashioned of sugar cane and reeds commissioned for the show.  Chung says that the weaver birds that had made nests out of the sugar cane leave she saw while she was traveling in Mauritius inspired her. It is ironic she says that the product that destroyed so many peoples’ lives and shifted the world in so many different ways could become this new creation.

Kelly Sinnapah Mary, a Guadeloupean artist exhibit three large, striking paintings as part of her series “Notebook of No Return: Memories,” (2022). She began this work in 2015 while she was researching her family tree, trying to distinguish her origin from Afro-Caribbean or Indo-Caribbean. According to Gosine, Mary’s work recognizes something fundamental about Caribbean Creole culture, which is the simultaneous presence of pleasure and violence.

Wendy Nannan has had a long career in her home country, but has less visibility in the United States or internationally. Much of Nannan’s work alludes to the mixing of cultures that typifies the Caribbean.

Margaret Chen alludes to her family’s migration story in her installation “Cross-Section of Labyrinth”. Chen traces her family’s origins to another form of economic migration.

Along with the four artists, Gosine has included a sound piece for the Ford Foundation’s soaring, plant-filled atrium in collaboration with an organization called Jahajee Sisters. This project was formed in response to the high rate of gender-based violence in the Indo-Caribbean community, which the group’s co-director, Simone Jhingoor, characterized as part of the long shadow that indentureship has cast on the community. 

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Barbados registering lower tourist arrivals

The summer season records unexpected lower tourist arrivals in Barbados

During the winter season, Barbados recorded a high level of tourist arrivals giving a positive trend to the summer season. However, the Barbados tourism officials are expressing concerns as the island is registering lower tourist arrivals. Indeed, according to Renee Coppin, the chairperson of the Barbados Hotel and Tourism Association (BHTA), despite strong winter arrivals to the island from December 2021 to April 2022, tourist arrivals are down 47.1 percent compared to 2019 levels. The average hotel occupancies for that same period December 2021, to April 2022, is down by 10.1 percent. The stat is more worrying as the Crop Over Festival is returning this year. Barbados will be hosting the annual Crop Over Festival with two of the biggest events of the festival hold, namely: the Grand Kadooment and Foreday Morning. The festival returns for the first time since the Covid-19 pandemic.

With other Caribbean Islands performing well, Barbados tourism officials remain optimistic and positive.  Although there is a call for the diversification of the local economy, tourism is still the best chance for the island to secure its future. Therefore, the government should continue to invest in the tourism industry. Besides, the results of a recent survey showed that Barbadians believe there were more benefits to garner from tourism than drawbacks.

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