By Lavern Clarke, Staff Reporter
Suzie Stitt focuses her camera on George Wright, while Director of Tourism, Fay Pickersgill and Jeff Darling look on. Ms. Stitt and Mr. Darling are photographers who participated in the development of the new Jamaica Tourist Board advertising campaign in February. Mr. Wright was sitting in a bar in Lucea when the photo team stopped by. - File
THE JAMAICA Tourist Board (JTB) has made the hard decision to strip down aspects of its operation, a position arrived at during last Wednesday's meeting of the twelve-member Board of Directors.
The Board's operational head, Tourism Director, Fay Pickersgill, confirmed the decision Monday, but said the magnitude of the cuts would be determined based on the results of a pending assessment by the JTB's Finance and Administration Division.
The move is the latest development in a verbal tussle between the state agency and tourism interests over the Board's efficiency and effectiveness, and follows on the resignation of Josef Forstmayr as a director of the JTB's board and his controversial recommendations for five new placements.
The decision to restructure comes on the heels of demands from hoteliers that the JTB slice away layers of administration and increase spending on advertising and marketing by 50 per cent.
But the agency caved only after looking at its meagre budget and realising that it would not be able to support the present levels of operations. Sources say the restructuring is likely to see closure of some regional offices overseas, but Mrs. Pickersgill says that decision will only be made after the Finance and Administration Division does its review.
JTB chairman William Clarke was said to be out of office for this week and could not reached for comment, but the decision to streamline the agency was made at a meeting he chaired.
JTB's budgetary allocation this year was US$35 million, but US$7.6 million of the amount has gone immediately to clear debt for credited advertising carried over from last year - leaving the Board with only US$27.4 million to split between administration and marketing.
It gives the tourism agency a little more than half of what it really requires to market Jamaica effectively - a figure Pickersgill puts at US$50 million. The restructuring is seen by industry sources as acceptance by the Board that the cash-strapped Government will not be able to find any extra funds this year to weather any crisis in the market. The Director and her team are also trying to determine how best to spend what they now have, but she indicated to Wednesday Business that marketing and advertisement would be getting greater priority, given the realities of ongoing terrorist alerts in the United States from where the island gets 70 per cent of its business.
The JTB is dragging its feet on whether to proceed with the US$145,000 (J$6.96m) organisational and efficiency review of the Board, a job for which management consultant Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu has been earmarked. Their reluctance stems from private criticisms that the expense could not be justified at a time when the JTB is facing financial constraints.
The contract has got regulatory stamp of approval from the National Contracts Commission, but is yet to be awarded. The Tourism Director says if the agency decides to go ahead with the review, the JTB would have to finance it from its budget. The decision would also have to hurdle the Tourism Minister and Cabinet approval.
Meantime, Forstmayr, who is president of the Jamaica Hotel and Tourist Association (JHTA), told Wednesday Business that he stands by his endorsement for placement of the Board of Directors of Zein Issa-Nakash, hoteliers Frank Rance, John Lynch and Paul Pennycooke, and airline executive Christopher Zacca, as persons who understand the business and have direct access to the large international tour companies and other big players, and the clout to bring business into the island.
The Minister did not respond to a query on when she plans to install the new board, but according to Pickersgill, the formal appointment of a reconstituted Board can only proceed if the previous JHTA appointees follow suit behind Forstmayr and resign. Otherwise, they have more than two more years to serve.
