Three new cruise lines will be homeporting at the Bridgetown Port next year filling part of the void created by the repositioning of major cruise ships from Barbados.
Chairman of Foster & Ince Cruise Services, Martin Ince, yesterday disclosed his company had successfully negotiated with German companies Aida Cruises and Mein Scheff and Kristina Cruises from Finland to do business with Barbados.
The Aida calls on Barbados from November, while the other ships will begin “a large programme” in November next year. All the ships will homeport in Barbados, providing what Ince considered to be a valuable boost to the island’s economy.
Barbados has been seeing an ongoing slide in cruise ship business, losing the service of large cruise ships to Australia, a factor which Ince attributed to that country “discovering cruising”.
Over the past two years, two Ocean Village ships were repositioned to Australia and this is the final year the Sea Princess will be calling here before shifting to Australia where it will be based during the 2011-2012 summer season.
In addition, Royal Caribbean cruise line has removed all its ships from the southern Caribbean for summer 2012.
And though Ince forecast the “slide” would continue from the 2011-2012 and 2012-2013 seasons, he insisted there was no need for panic.
“Whilst we are seeing some ships leave us, we are seeing some ships that had never been to us that should replace them.”
However, Ince acknowleged there would still be a shortfall.
He said that “from a homeporting standpoint, I think 2012 will see a substantial decline”, which he attributed to high fuel costs in Barbados’ traditional British market and that country’s Air Passenger Duty (APD) imposed on British travellers.Ince said those factors had been “a major blow for the homeporting business in the Caribbean”.
Along with manager of Foster & Ince Cruise Services, Robert Hutson, and manager of Platinum Port Agency Inc., Kevin Yearwood, Ince flew more than 30 000 miles between February and March this year and had seen about 90 per cent of the cruise lines to secure replacement cruise business for Barbados.
While he was optimistic Barbados’ cruise sector would recover, Ince suggested an audit ought to be carried out on the island’s attractions.
Meanwhile, director of cruise tourism at the Barbados Tourism Authority, Ryan Blackett, said the island “had not really done anything to revamp its product offering within the last couple of years” and this should be analysed and a better job done not just for cruise tourism but tourism in general.
