Antigua and Barbuda on track to set cruise, overnight tourism record

Black Immigrant Daily News

Antigua and Barbuda is on course to break tourist arrival records in 2023 and confirm the recovery of the country’s economic mainstay in the aftermath of the pandemic.

According to Prime Minister Gaston Browne, reports suggest that 2023 will be a bumper year for the tourism industry with positive benefits overall for Antigua and Barbuda’s economy. “I am told that for 2023, the cruise sector will be so strong that we will exceed the record breaking year 2019.

“The same is true for overnight visitors; those numbers are set to eclipse those of 2018. In fact, the port itself is on a trajectory to break the record year of business activity it achieved back in 2018,” PM Browne said over the weekend.

The prime minister continued that these projections augur well for Antigua and Barbuda’s economic outlook in 2023. “I am pretty sure that, barring Guyana, Antigua and Barbuda will have the strongest growing economy in the Caribbean next year in this the post-COVID era,” he stated.

Already, cruise arrivals for 2022 have surpassed 2021 when the world was still in the grips of the COVID-19 pandemic.

So far this year, a total of 184,108 cruise visitors have been welcomed to Antigua and Barbuda, a significant increase over 2021’s 86,215.

Stayover visits have also improved with an increase in the month-to-month arrivals reported by the Ministry of Tourism.

Bolstering optimism in the industry, according to Prime Minister Browne, is the fact that the country’s room stock will soon receive a boost with the reopening of Jolly Beach this December and the Royalton Chic, formerly Halcyon Cove, by the last quarter of 2023.

He said the demand for Antigua and Barbuda as a tourist destination remains high in the global marketplace, however, this has at times been negatively affected by an inadequate supply of hotel rooms. -POINTE XPRESS

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