The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL

Tribune Business Editor

nhartnell@tribunemedia.net

The Bahamas is targeting “double digit growth” in visitor arrivals for 2014, a senior tourism official yesterday saying that Baha Mar’s arrival would “bring out the best in Atlantis”.

With the $2.6 billion Cable Beach project set to begin full operations in December next year, David Johnson, the Ministry of Tourism’s director-general, told Tribune Business that together with Paradise Island this nation would have “two horses pulling these islands”.

Echoing tourism minister Obie Wilchcombe, Mr Johnson described 2013 as “a transition year”, noting that the year-over-year decline in total visitor arrivals to the Bahamas had been exacerbated by the loss of room inventory at Cable Beach and in Grand Bahama.

Disclosing that the Ministry of Tourism and private sector were “very bullish” on winter 2013 and going into next year, the director-general told Tribune Business: “I can tell that we’re anticipating achieving double digit growth in 2014, and exceeding that in 2015.”

Apart from Baha Mar’s arrival and end to construction at Cable Beach, Mr Johnson said room inventory levels - and the overall Bahamian tourism product - would receive a 2014 boost from the re-opening of the Grand Lucayan’s 500-room Reef Village complex.

Focusing on the three-way agreement between the Government, Sunwing/Blue Diamond Resorts and the Government, Mr Johnson described it as integral to “getting the model right” on Grand Bahama.

“What we’re doing on Grand Bahama is changing out to a completely different product, making it a completely different destination, creating a different experience that we’ve never had in Grand Bahama.”

At the same time, Baha Mar’s project will “getting its legs underneath it”, and emerging into its first full year in 2015.

“The Baha Mar factor will bring out the best in Atlantis as well,” Mr Johnson told Tribune Business. “You’ll have two horses pulling the marketplace on this island.

“We are comfortably poised for a solid rebound over the next 24 months, and consecutive years of growth. We’re very, very bullish once we get through the fall months into winter and beyond.”

Mr Johnson said the Ministry of Tourism had anticipated the loss of room inventory, both at the Grand Lucayan and the Wyndham Nassau Resort, would impact stopover visitor arrivals for 2013.

“For the first four to five months we were off roughly 6-7 per cent in Nassau,” he added. “The Out Islands are the only area that is up slightly compared to a year ago, but only slightly.

“Grand Bahama is a bit behind because of the loss of the Vision Air programme and loss of the Reef Village. With construction and the loss of inventory on Cable Beach, we expected a challenge in growing business.”

Yet, focusing on what he said was a more promising future, Mr Johnson added: “We’re readying for what we expect to be a huge rebound in 2014. This is a year of transition, construction and loss of inventory.

“That’s reflected in our numbers not being as buoyant as we’d like them to be. The reality of construction perceptions, when it comes to the western end of Nassau, is that Europeans, Canadians and many Americans perceive the place as being under work, and will avoid that until it’s finished. We’re working through that experience.”

The Central Bank of the Bahamas, in its June monthly economic developments report, said growth in tourist arrivals for the first four months of 2013 fell to 2.7 per cent, from 8.3 per cent in 2012, for a 2.3 million visitor count.

“The high value-added air segment contracted by 6.8 per cent, contrasting with the prior year’s 10.2 per cent expansion, while the 5.4 per cent rise in sea traffic extended the year-earlier 7.8 per cent gain,” the report said.

“By port of entry, visitors to New Providence firmed by 9.6 per cent to 1.3 million, as a 17.1 per cent hike in the dominant sea segment outpaced the 6.8 per cent decline in air arrivals.

“In contrast, the Grand Bahama market fell by 2.4 per cent, on account of a 21 per cent reduction in air visitors, which outweighed the 0.8 per cent rise in the sea component.

“The 6.8 per cent drop in visitors to the Family Islands was primarily explained by a 7.7 per cent fall-off in the dominant sea traffic, as air arrivals were higher by 1.7 per cent.”