Q & A with John D. Lynch, Director of Tourism and Chairman of the Jamaica Tourist Board (JTB)

Jamaica attended FITUR 2009 with a large delegation headed by Tourism Minister Edmund Bartlett and John Lynch, Director of Tourism and Chairman of the Jamaica Tourist Board (JTB). In an exclusive interview with Caribbean News Digital, Mr. Lynch talked enthusiastically about his country’s travel industry, its achievements and the prospects for the ongoing year. Mr. Lynch is confident in Jamaica’s potentials as a tourism powerhouse in the Caribbean and so far the numbers are proving him right.

Q- Mr. Lynch, this is not your first time at FITUR, is it?
A- Yes, it is. I’ve been at every other show, like BIT in Italy several times, and of course at ITB. But this is my first time at FITUR.

Q- Could we talk generally about the main goals you have here in FITUR?
A- As you know, the Spanish market to Jamaica has gotten stronger and stronger over the last five years and it is an important market to Jamaica. We have a significant amount of Spanish investment in Jamaica and we have quite a few hotels. As the matter of fact, our relation with the government of Spain is excellent. The King of Spain is going to be visiting Jamaica next month.

Q- Next month?
A- We look forward to welcoming him. The overall situation is that Spain is now one of our top markets for visitors to Jamaica. I have just been named Chairman of the Jamaican Tourist Board and Director of Tourism, so it’s the fist time I come to FITUR.

Q- So, you say that the Spanish market has been growing during the last year?
A- The market from Spain and Portugal have just explored to Jamaica. We get over 30 thousand visitors between the two countries.

Q- Why do you think this is actually happening?
A- Mainly it’s because of the influx of the Spanish hotels and, of course, they’ve understood the market and the new idea the Spanish visitor is looking for. Jamaica is a great destination with lots of to-do’s and it works very well.

Q- Do you believe the excellent ratio between quality and price of hotels and places in Jamaica is just another allure to bear in mind?
A- Yes. We use the Jamaican dollar, but the pricing with the hotels are done in US dollars. Of course, in years gone by the European currency was extremely strong, but the pricing in Jamaica is good. We have extremely good prices in comparison to our main competitors.

Q- Does that mean that the Spanish investment in tourism in Jamaica has been beneficial for the country?
A- Absolutely. It works very well. They are very good partners not only it has worked well in Spain, it works very well with United States and Canada. They bring a lot of new products to the island.

Q- How many offices does JTB have around the world?
A- We have, of course, offices in Jamaica, in Montego Bay and Ocho Rios, we have a main office in Miami, which looks after the United States, one office in Canada, one office in London and we have representatives all over the European continent. As you know, we have a representative office here in Madrid.

Q- Do you also take care of the relationships with the press and communication means?
A- Yes.

Q- Looking back to 2008 as stacked up against 2007, right now when everybody is so concerned with the ongoing crisis, how do you assess the behavior of tourism in Jamaica during 2008 as compared to 2007?
A- 2007 was our best year and 2008 was even better. We had a tremendous results in the first half of the year and we ended it up with a 4 percent increase in arrivals in 2008 over 2007.

Q- So, in moments when almost everybody is whining about the situation of the outbound markets, you had a successful year.
A- We had a lot of new products. I think Jamaica is exciting right now. We’ve done a lot of things. We’re not turning over and playing dead. We’re promoting ourselves though the trouble because tourism is very important in Jamaica and we have to work on it. Everyday you look at markets and look at some numbers by one of our top Canadian producers over, here at the meeting, and you see how figures are running parallel to those in 2008. So, there is real sunshine in every dark cloud. You talk to some tour operators there and that’s what you get, the feeling you get.

Everyday, if you look on television, some days you don’t feel like getting up from bed. But you’ve got to keep promoting, promoting and promoting. To be honest, hotels are doing very creative pricing to make people come. We’re doing well. Our first four weeks, I get the advanced figures of arrivals in Jamaica pretty flat with 2008, which as I said was our best year. We’re fighting.

Q- Somebody told me that you have a great expertise in airlines. Is that right?
A- I have been in the board of directors of Air Jamaica a couple of times, but I have been associated with Jamaica Vacations, which is a charter, and as the matter of fact I’m chairman of the board there. I worked for the Tourism Board for 15-plus years and I got to work for Sandals Resorts for 15-plus years, so that’s basically it.

Q- Do you see in the foreseeable future that there could be more airlines flying to Jamaica to increase the flow of tourists?
A- We certainly would encourage certain schedule service out of Europe. There was some talk with Air Comet for flying from Madrid. I think that’s been put on hold now just because of the economic situation. But I think, from what I’ve been speaking with Air Comet, that we are organizing this thing, but there were bilateral talks between Spain and Jamaica last year for scheduled service between the two countries.