BRIDGETOWN, Barbados, Mar 7, CMC – The Barbados-based Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) Tuesday predicted that visitor arrivals to the region this year will surpass the pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic figures as the Caribbean recorded a significant increase in tourist arrivals last year.
CTO acting Secretary General, Neil Walters, told a news conference that nearly 90 percent of the region’s travel demand for 2019 has already been recovered, and some destinations have already passed their pandemic levels.
“Compared to 2022, it is expected that overall regional arrivals will increase by between 10 and 15 percent. This means that between 31.2 and 32.6 million tourists can be expected to visit the region this year (and) thus arrivals this year might surpass pre-pandemic levels,” he told reporters.
Walters said in 2023, the cruise industry is also anticipated to continue recovering and expanding “as more ships are deployed, the capacity for cruises will rise, and demand will stay high.
“All regional ports have re-opened, and some have started homeporting. In the region, there should be between 32 million and 33 million cruise visits overall, which is a five to 10 percent increase over the pre-COVID baseline figure,” he added.
Walters said that the tourism industry worldwide was characterized by solid recovery, and according to data from the World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), approximately 917 million tourists traveled internationally.
The figures showed that this arrivals level doubled that of 2021, representing 62.2 percent of pre-pandemic levels. All world regions recorded significant improvements in their 2021 performances, even though they trailed the figures recorded in 2019.
He told reporters that while most destinations stopped collecting survey data, which hampered the generation of tourist expenditure figures, a few sectors involved with the tourism industry would have signaled increased revenues in 2022.
“More extended stays would have generated significant increases in visitor spending in destinations, higher costs due partly to inflation, and larger volumes of travelers and their willingness to spend money while traveling.
“It is estimated that visitors to the Caribbean region spent between US$36.5 billion and US$37.5 billion in 2022, an increase of 70 percent to 75 percent compared to 2021.,” the CTO official said.
Walters said that in its New Year’s message, the CTO would have indicated the “strong recovery” in Caribbean tourism during last year, adding, “today we can confirm that in 2022, the second full year of the global pandemic, the Caribbean tourism industry was resilient and built on the rebound that was noticeable by the middle of 2021.
“By the end of 2022, there were 28.3 million registered tourist visits to the Caribbean, approximately 52.4 percent more than in 2021. The region accounted for 33.1 percent of all arrivals worldwide, down one percentage point from the historic high share … recorded in 2021.”
Walters said the tourist arrivals last year comprised just over 80 percent of the baseline year of 2019 for typical tourism activity before the pandemic.
“This the Caribbean was one of the regions with the quickest recovery rates globally in 2022,” he said, noting that with international travel restrictions being further relaxed and solid demands for travel from the region’s premier source market, the United States, also contributed to the increase in arrivals last year.
“However, the industry’s recovery and growth were undermined throughout the year by negative effects including the rise in prices, the intermittent supply chain disruptions caused by the pandemic, labor shortage and disputes.”
He said that despite the discovery of the Omicron and other COVID-19 variants and the restatement of travel bans in January last year, Caribbean vacations were usually intense and that the region recorded increased arrivals every month.
He said during the winter season; there were 1.7 million tourist visits last year, 124 percent more than the previous year. During the summer last year, 19.1 tourists visited the region, a 32.6 percent increase from a year earlier.
“Except for Haiti, which showed a 20. Three percent…where the well-documented crisis negatively impacted the industry and the US Virgin Islands, which showed negative 3.2 percent…all 27 destinations showed an increase in stayover compared to 2021 of 8.3 percent and a 16-fold increase.
“In addition, 14 destinations saw an increase in arrivals in one or more months in 2022 compared to the same time in 2019. The US Virgin Islands, St. Marten, the Turks and Caicos Islands, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, and Curacao are the six countries which have surpassed their total pre-pandemic arrival numbers.”
He said all regions of the Caribbean recorded an increase in international visitor arrivals, but only the Dutch Caribbean and US territories surpassed their 2019 levels.
He said the US markets continue to drive the Caribbean tourist industry, with travel from North America accounting for 51. 5 percent of all arrivals to the region last year, down from the 61.4 percent share the previous year. After the US, the European market. It was the region’s second-best source market.
Regarding the performance of the hotel sector last year, Walters said that the region had recorded improvements in all significant segments from 4.4 percent in 2021 in hotel occupancy, increasing to 60.7 percent last year.
”The average daily rate increased by 21.7 percent to US$290.60 during this time, and revenue per available room surged by 66. 4 percent to 176.46 cents. The number of available rooms was up by 4.4 percent, and per room, income increased by 7.3.6 percent”
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