Jamaica is ranked number one in summer bookings by US travelers above all other Caribbean destinations.
This is according to the island’s Minister of Tourism Edmund Bartlett.
Minister Bartlett made the revelation during a meeting with tourism stakeholders and senior executives of Flight Centre Travel Group (FLT) at FLT’s US headquarters in New Jersey.
“This is great news as we actively work on recovery in the US, which is our biggest source market. Based on these booking numbers Jamaica may experience the best summer ever since the pandemic,” said Bartlett.
“Part of our recovery strategy is meeting with our long-standing tourism partners like Flight Centre to get a feel of market sentiment and projections and we are happy that Jamaica remains top of mind,” added Bartlett.
Members of the Jamaica Tourist Board, who were also present at the meeting, also expressed their optimism for the local tourism industry, post-COVID-19.
“We are aggressively working towards recovery, and we cannot do this without partners like Flight Centre. As travel rebounds, we aim to ensure that Jamaica is the first choice for visitors,” said Donovan White, Director of Tourism, Jamaica.
In 2021, Jamaica hosted more than 1.54 million overnight visitors. The country’s 2021 visitor totals were driven by U.S. vacationers, who accounted for 1,278,679 overnight, land-based air arrivals in 2021.
During the weekend of March 3 to 6, 2022, Jamaica also welcomed approximately 27,000 visitors — the highest number for any one single day since Jamaica reopened its borders to visitors in June of 2020.
According to Bartlett, should current trends continue, Jamaica to close out “the first four months of the year with 925,000 stopover arrivals and earnings of US$1.17 billion.”
He projected that by year-end there would be visitor arrivals of 2.92 million, and earnings of US$3.58 billion, which would not be far behind pre-COVID-2019 earnings.
