ANTIGUA & BARBUDA TOURISM AUTHORITY

The Ministry of Tourism is gearing up to conduct a series of training activities under the Organization of American States (OAS) sponsored Capacity Building: Tourism Training and Certification Project (2008/2011).  The project aims to enhance the competitiveness and sustainability of the country’s tourism sector through the upgrade of employee skills.

The final year project activities will maintain focus on the development of a professional and skilled tourism workforce.  It will also continue to provide an excellent opportunity for hospitality and tourism workers to enhance their skills in specific identified areas and to gain internationally recognised certification and designation through the American Hotel & Lodging Educational Institute (AH&LEI).

In 2011, the activities will focus on offering Hospitality Skills Certification (HSC) and designation to employees in the Housekeeping, Front Desk and Food and Beverage departments.  Already scheduled are the HSC training programme for Guest Room Attendants , February 7-11 and for the Front Desk Staff, March 21-25.   The expectation is that through these programmes, the twin-island tourism destination will benefit from an increase in the numbers of skilled employees to deliver, operate and manage the country’s tourism product.

As the world continues to go through challenging economic times which in many instances have resulted in the reduction of available project funds from donor agencies, the Ministry is extremely appreciative of the resources approved by OAS to add to its own limited financial resources. We feel that it is very critical that during this period, emphasis continues to be placed on raising the quality of the tourism product and service as improving the overall skills base of the employees engaged in the tourism and hospitality industry has the added advantage of enhancing the image of the tourism product.

Almost 200 hotel owners and managers and other employees in the areas of Hotel Management, Food and Beverage, Front Office, Housekeeping and Training and Development received training over the first two years of the project (2008-2010).

As a multinational project with financial sponsorship of the OAS, other beneficiaries in addition to Antigua and Barbuda are Belize and St. Kitts and Nevis.