By Garwin Davis, Assistant News EditorLOCAL TOURISM interests are worried that Jamaica's lack of presence in the critical overseas markets of Europe and the United States, could cause the country to lose its already dwindling market share to other destinations.
The fears stem from reports that the country is again in arrears with advertising agencies in both Europe and the United States, which have led to the pulling of all television ads involving Jamaica.
This makes for the second time in two years that the island is experiencing what some are calling "a major international embarrassment", having only last year cleared a US$5 million debt with New York-based ad agency, Foote, Cone and Beldin (FCB).
The agency in November 2000 had pulled Jamaica's ads from the airwaves, after the country had not only exhausted its line of credit, but had failed to make payments on outstanding debts.
"The situation demands that the Jamaica Tourist Board (JTB) goes back to advertise by early May," said Josef Forstmayr, president of the Jamaica Hotel and Tourist Association (JHTA). "Our competitors are out there and we run the risk of losing our market share. We may want to bury our heads in the sand and pretend as if things are okay, but I am here to tell you that they are not - it will be an abysmal summer if things do not get back on track soon."
Asked to explain why the country had not been extended a line of credit instead of the ads being pulled, the JHTA head notes that "our payment history with FCB has been somewhat bad for the past 10 years. We have had a history of overruns which was cleared up last summer. It is natural in business that if you can't pay your bills, then you can't forward spend - it's as simple as that."
Mr. Forstmayr said the actual JTB budget is dealing with what he referred to as an "overhang" from the end of the financial year 2001/02, and that the figure of US$7.6 million had not been paid over to the JTB by the Ministry of Finance, hence the reason for the arrears with the ad agencies.
"The bottom line is that the JTB has been underfunded in its quest to effectively deal with all the different concerns of our industry for years," the JHTA president added.
"I am told that Barbados's budget for worldwide advertising is US$40 million; ours last year was almost half of that. A lot of 'lip service' is always given to this industry, but if we are really serious we wouldn't be putting tourism through all of what the sector has been experiencing."
Owner of the Wexford Court Hotel in Montego Bay, Godfrey Dyer, was even more forthright. "It's embarrassing," he said. "Our island competitors are not only eating into our business, they are also laughing at us privately. "I hope good sense dictates that the JTB is given the money to resume our advertising campaign on overseas television."
Following last July's violence in West Kingston, the island's image as a safe tourist destination took a severe beating. This led to the formation of what became known as 'Operation Grow', a programme created specifically to rehabilitate the country's image in the overseas market. Then came September 11. The devastating impact caused by the terrorist attacks on the United States was felt immediately. Lay-offs became the order of the day throughout the travel sector worldwide, and forced countries like Jamaica to find additional revenue to maintain a presence in the marketplace. This sort of presence, industry players note, had enabled the island from "not disappearing entirely into permanent oblivion."
Repeated efforts to get a comment from Minister of Tourism, Portia Simpson Miller, and Director of Tourism, Fay Pickersgill, were unsuccessful. Both were said to be out of office for the day.
