Tourism Officials Respond to Big Drop in Cayman Islands’ Cruise Visits

Tourism Officials Respond to Big Drop in Cayman Islands’ Cruise Visits
By Kevin Watler

Tourism Association members say something must be done to boost cruise tourism on Island. That after staggering statistics show cruise passenger arrivals in October were down almost half from the same month in 2010.

Outgoing CITA executive director says the organization needs to get more involved, and work with government on its plan to build a new cruise berthing facility in George Town.

“One of the discussions that our board of directors recently had is that we are going to reach out to government because we haven’t been a part of the conversation with what’s happening with China Harbor or we haven’t had a lot of insight into what’s going on with the project. So we’re going to reach out in the near future to say look, we need to be at the table. We need to be part of the discussion. And we need to be part of the solution,” Former CITA Executive Director, said.

But CITA won’t be doing that with Ms. Savage at the helm. She has stepped down executive director and Jane Van Der Bol has taken the role. Ms. Van Der Bol is owner of Cayman Luxury Charter and says Cayman has many attractions and projects that eventually should boost cruise ship arrivals.

“I know the industry. I’ve been in it for the last three or four years on the water sports side. And I’m very excited to see the future of what happens to Cayman. I think we have a lot of great things on the table, in the works –the pier being one of them. We have Cayman Economic City coming up. We have Dart expansion and these are all good things for our industry. But at the same time we have tough company out there in the Caribbean and we need to stay on top of it.

Government continues to work toward finalizing a deal with china harbor engineering company to build the port. Government’s MOU with China Harbor lasts until March of 2012.