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FIVE PILLARS OF GROWTH FOR TOURISM SECTOR
Thursday 10th January 2013

Minister of Tourism and Civil Aviation the Hon. John Maginley has identified the major areas of focus for his ministry in the year 2013. These were outlined in his recent contribution to the budget debate in the lower house on Tuesday.

The Ministry of Tourism, for 2013 will focus on five pillars of growth namely human resource development, product development, marketing and promotion, airlift and the creation of a strong enabling environment for the development of the sector.

The five pillars of growth were identified in an effort to achieve the primary objectives of the Ministry for 2013 which feature more importantly a need to create more and better jobs, a need to consolidate higher investment returns and a need to make businesses more sustainable so that they can promote greater sector growth. Furthermore there is an added thrust within the Ministry to raise awareness and support for the sustainable use of resources.

In the area of human resource development emphasis will be placed on training and capacity building, tourism awareness programs and voluntary certifications; building upon the recent collaboration with the OAS in 2012 which saw over 200 tourism and hospitality workers being trained in various fields.

According to Minister Maginley 2013 will see the implementation of projects from the Tourism Development Plan commissioned last year. He noted that “it is important to state that the sustainable governance of the tourism sector is crucial for the good management of the destination in collaboration with public and private players”. This is also the approach taken with regards to product development which the ministry intends to be market driven.

“The tourism development program will help to diversify tourism product offerings in order to satisfy the varying and diverse needs of our visitors, attract new market segments with new core and complementary products, increase global competitiveness, increase visitor expenditure, and enhance visitor satisfaction with cultural, natural and man-made sites by encouraging strategic sites and asset development”, states Minister Maginley. It is the intention that an inter-ministerial tourism committee and the institutionalization of the public-private tourism partnership initiative will form the platform of the sustainable governance structure to be introduced in 2013.

The core of the Minister’s presentation in Parliament centered on the 2013 marketing initiative which is outlined to be a new destination marketing strategy focused on upgrading Antigua and Barbuda’s brand and repositioning the destination in the tourism marketplace. The marketing plan also focuses on sales and operational marketing, a market intelligence system and an enhanced Connectivity Development Program.

The latter component brings to the fore the Antigua and Barbuda Ministry of Tourism Digital Evolution to be launched in the coming months dubbed “bringing Antigua and Barbuda to life”. The evolution is a top notch integrated online strategy to deliver the best in-class digital experience to all current and potential visitors across the globe. Minister Maginley expounds…”included in our roadmap: a brand new global website, integrated social media, world class user experience including dynamic content management , booking facilities, mobile commerce functions and a geo-targeted multi-lingual function with 8 different languages.”

The Minister of Tourism used the opportunity of the Budget Debate to reveal that, “we have been approached and signed a deal with Earth TV, a global TV camera company with over 300 cameras worldwide, which streams live on to international TV networks in real time…Antigua and Barbuda were selected for two TV camera placements and will be the first Caribbean island to have these equipment installed.” He continued that, “this development will increase our exposure and give us huge returns for a minimal cost of just paying for the power and the internet rather than the annual cost of $30,000 each per year”.

A unique extension to the digital marketing approach is the commencement of a destination mobile smart-phone presence.  In February this year Antigua and Barbuda will be the first country to launch a fully functioning M-commerce APP relevant to IPAD and IPHONE users.
The Ministry of Tourism through the Antigua and Barbuda Tourism Authority embarked on an aggressive airlift strategy in 2012 and will continue to focus on this as a priority area in 2013. The Hon. Minister of Tourism reported that Antigua and Barbuda’s tourism growth rate has been linear for the most part, and this trend is consistent with other major destinations in the Caribbean.

More in-depth information on the Minister of Tourism and Civil Aviations contribution to the Budget Debate, will be made available on the government’s website at www.antigua.gov.ag.

 


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