Minister of Tourism Edmund Bartlett (left) is all smiles as he presents Paulette Murray (left) of Philadelphia with a bouquet of flowers as he welcomes her as the historic one millionth stop-over visitor to the island for the year to date. Enjoying the moment is her husband Henry.

 

Jamaica’s tourism industry marked a historical milestone last week with Minister of Tourism Edmund Bartlett welcoming the millionth stopover visitor to the island for the year to date. In tandem with this landmark achievement, the tourism sector has also earned in excess of US$1.2 billion for the same period.

“This is the first time ever that we have recorded a million stopover arrivals before the middle of the year. We are very excited about that because it feeds into the growth projections that we have,” said Bartlett after greeting Paulette Murray and her husband Henry, who arrived at the Sangster International Airport (SIA) on an American Airlines flight out of Philadelphia, USA.

The Henrys, who are here on their fourth visit, are in Jamaica for a family vacation.

It was earlier projected that the millionth visitor would arrive on or about the end of June. However, Bartlett said all projections were being exceeded and at the end of May there were 970,000 visitors, “rising sharply to today’s million”.

He said this was significant, “not only because it means a million opportunities are provided for jobs and for earnings, but it also helps to quantify the actual revenue flow in foreign exchange into the country and I’m very pleased to announce, therefore, that for the first time in our history, before the end of June, in any year, we have achieved one million visitor arrivals and earned in excess of US$1.2 billion.”

According to Bartlett, incrementally, on top of last year’s tourism earnings, an additional $850 million had gone into the Jamaican economy.

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/jamaica-welcomes-millionth-visitor-earns-us-1-2b_102605