Arabian Travel Market 2006 is on course to set a new visitor attendance record for the event with 11 percent more trade professionals attending in the first two days than in last year´s previous high. Some 6,899 trade visitors attended the show at the Dubai World Trade Centre in the first two days with nearly 836 media covering the exhibition, 25 percent more than last year.

The Caribbean island nation of St Lucia is now enduring a pleasant assault of visitors that over the next two weeks will perform at St. Lucia Jazz, the region´s most longstanding jazz festival that opened in the capital city of Castries this weekend. St Lucia Minister of Tourism, Philip Pierre said hotel bookings are strong, the venues are hot, and the people of St Lucia are celebrating the 15th anniversary of the festival.

A Caribbean environmental advocate wants national hotel associations across the region to help small hotel managers understand the importance of investing in low cost energy-saving environmental technologies. Jamaican Hugh Cresser, who managed the recently expired Environment Audits for Sustainable Tourism (EAST) USAID-funded project in Jamaica for the past eight years, told the 8th Annual Caribbean Conference on Sustainable Tourism Development (STC-8) in Puerto Rico that national hotel and tourism associations should help their members implement programs that are both profitable and sustainable.

For the first time, the demand for tickets to attend next year´s World Cricket Cup in the Caribbean can be quantified and the numbers are “already flattering”. Speaking mere hours after the launch of the tournament´s Public Ticketing Program, ICC Cricket World Cup West Indies 2007 Inc. Commercial Manager Stephen Price revealed that the website (www.cricketworldcup.com) on which fans can apply for tickets was “flooded with applications from the second it opened” last night.

The International Travel Partners Conference (ITPC) brought top buyers and sellers to Grand Bahama Island. The conference, which came to a close on May 3 in Grand Bahama, was held at Westin & Sheraton at Our Lucaya Resort in Grand Bahama.

The heart and soul of the Caribbean will touch New York City as never before when some of the region´s favorite performers convey the immortal spiritual psyche of Caribbean people at a gospel concert on June 11, 2006. The inaugural Caribbean Gospelfest will be one of the highlights of Caribbean Week in New York 2006, which takes place from June 11-17.