The Tribune

By NATARIO McKENZIE

Tribune Business Reporter

nmckenzie@tribunemedia.net

TOURISM officials along with Baha Mar executives are continuing their push to get an additional 300,000 airlines seats to Nassau per year to facilitate the mega resort, director general David Johnson telling Tribune Business, “We have to make it happen’.

“We are continuing our planning with Baha Mar team members in the mix. We are still bit early in terms of any specific commitment. For the airlines, their forward planning is 6-9 months out. We want to be early to prepare them for what’s coming in the fourth quarter of 2014. Commitments and specifics in terms of what will be agreed and when it will come on stream will not likely be confirmed much before January of next year but between now and then we have we are lining our horses so to speak and getting them acquainted with or needs,” said Mr Johnson.

Mr Johnson said: “We are looking at something like 300,000 more seats per annum. We have to make it happen. The air seats are infrastructure. If you want to get to one part of the island you have to have the road. We must have those seats because our visitors have to fly in. We are committed to causing it to happen. We have many options to get us there and we are just fine tuning the options to get us there. No one airline, or two or three will do it but if everyone increase what they are doing by 25 per cent we would get there.”

Mr Johnson said that talks were being held with carriers already serving Nassau on increasing their capacity. “We also look to add new market opportunities which the new resort brings. We’re looking at Latin America, parts of Europe and parts of Asia we can focus more on as a result of that project,” said Mr Johnson.