Visitor arrivals may no longer be reliable indicators of tourism’s health since tourists have cut back on their spending.
The perceived decline in spending now had to be researched and quantified according to Winfield Griffith, director of research, information and technology of the Caribbean Tourism Organization.
Griffith said: “traditionally people had been looking at the hard arrival numbers and using those as an indication of the health of tourism but what we have seen . . . is [that there are] sometimes spurts in arrivals out of the UK, but that is not matched by increase spending.
“On the other hand you will find a great deal of what the economists call substitution seems to be taking place, so that even where you get a modest increase in arrivals out of the market, we are still seeing substantial decline in average spending because people are holding back on . . . they are cutting out non-essentials.”
Read the full story in today’s WEEKEND NATION.
