Monique Hepburn, News Editor
Sandals Montego Bay scuba diving instructor, Valentine Reid, speaks to guests after a diving session, recently. - Contributed
WESTERN BUREAU:
WHILE THE CARICOM Single Market (CSM) seem poised to catch many Jamaican workers off guard, Montego Bay-based scuba diving instructor Valentine Reid is ready.
"I know what the CSM is all about. It will impact my life positively. I expect things to get better," Mr. Reid told The Sunday Gleaner. "I am not afraid of it or the fact that other Caribbean workers will be able to come here because I try to be A-1 at what I do. Everyone must try to raise the standards of their work and if they do, they have nothing to fear."
Mr. Reid's view of the upcoming market regime is very similar to the views of numerous regional leaders who expect the CARICOM Single Market (CSM), which will come into force in January 2006, to place their respective territories in a favourable economic position.
REGIONAL
As a service-driven industry, tourism will be one of the first to be impacted by the regime and already, public and private interests have been taking a regional approach to branding and marketing.
Regional hotel chains will be the first to reap even greater expansion, having already set down roots in various territories.
"We already have some chain hotels, Sandals and SuperClubs, which have been able to gain a foothold in the region," Horace Peterkin, president of the Jamaica Hotel and Tourist Association (JHTA) told The Sunday Gleaner on Friday. "Those organisations should be able to take advantage of the free movement of labour, which at times was a bit challenging."
The JHTA head however foresees possible repercussions following the implementation of the CSM and cited Jamaica's high unemployment rate as a mitigating factor.
JA NEEDS SKILLED PERSONS
"Jamaica has a very high unemployment rate and the truth is that we need more skilled top-level supervisory management and other skilled persons in areas such as culinary and water sports and these can be filled with people from the outside," he said.
Tourism Minister, Aloun Assamba, said that Caribbean tourism leaders are far ahead in their preparation for the Single Market and thus, foresees a smooth transition.
"We have had the Caribbean tourism ministers already organised as the Caribbean Tourism Organisation and we have the private sector side, which is the Caribbean Hotel Association, and so, in tourism we have already been acting as if we are a single market although we are competitors."
COOPERATION
"Several areas in tourism lend themselves to cooperation, namely, marketing, cruise shipping, bottling and distribution," Edmund Bartlett, Opposition Spokesman on Tourism, explained. "It is not hard to see how we can all benefit."
"If we are able to come up with ideas that create the linkages and critical elements to the value chain and provide profit in various communities, then that is where we start."
According to Mr. Bartlett, air and ground transportation entities can be regionalised.
"Because no individual country has been able to run a profitable airline, one could be considered regionally, where a cabotage system is applied."
