Tourism Ministers of the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) met in regular session at their 8th OECS Council of Tourism Ministers Meeting, held at the NIS Conference Room in St. Vincent and the Grenadines on April 21st, 2009. 

The main purposes of the meeting were to track progress on and advance implementation of tourism-related mandates received from a Special Joint Meeting of the OECS Authority and the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB) Monetary Council, which was held in mid-January 2009 in response to the impact of the global financial and economic crisis on the OECS economy.

Country updates from the participating OECS Member States revealed many similarities in the challenges being faced across the OECS tourism sector, in particular: reductions in visitor arrivals and hotel occupancies; a scaling back of new investments; the emergence of direct and indirect job losses and the need to strengthen and expand linkages between tourism and other productive sectors, in particular agriculture. 

These commonalities suggested clear avenues for collaboration in devising and implementing urgent, short term and long run solutions. In that regard, Ministers agreed that there was a need to go beyond the provision of temporary relief measures geared at lowering operating costs for tourism businesses, and to move towards implementation of economic stimulus strategies particularly targeting small tourism enterprises. 

A commitment was also made to the establishment of a permanent mechanism to facilitate joint marketing and multi-destination tourism across the OECS islands, which would involve a committee of OECS Directors of Tourism, supported by a coordinator to be located within the OECS Secretariat responsible for joint marketing programmes and other areas of functional cooperation in the sector. 

Allied to this decision to renew their commitment to joint marketing, OECS Tourism Ministers agreed to take the necessary steps in each Member State to facilitate implementation of a decision taken in January by the OECS Authority, to apply a levy to each airline ticket purchased for travel into the OECS, as part of a wider Caribbean initiative. The proceeds of that levy will go directly into a proposed US$ 60 Million Caribbean tourism marketing fund to be administered jointly by the Caribbean Tourism Organisation (CTO) and the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association (CHTA). 

OECS Tourism Ministers took that bold decision with the understanding that the OECS region will receive direct benefits from the regional marketing campaign in support of the individual efforts of OECS destinations at developing and marketing their tourism product. It is expected that other members of the CTO, both CARICOM and non-CARICOM, will be encouraged to follow suit in implementing this revenue measure, and that the regional tourism marketing fund will also receive substantial contributions from cruise lines plying the waters of the wider Caribbean.  

In conclusion, Tourism Ministers mandated the OECS Secretariat to collaborate with the ECCB and the respective OECS national tourism authorities in preparing a position paper for presentation to a subsequent Joint Meeting of the OECS Authority and ECCB Monetary Council scheduled for June 2009. That submission is expected to include a clearly articulated up-to-date account of the adverse impact of the global crisis on the OECS tourism economy, which will serve as a backdrop for enunciating specific policy recommendations for enhancing the immediate, short term and long term prospects for tourism in the OECS.