Royal Caribbean's Freedom of the Seas is currently the largest vessel visiting Jamaica. The Oasis of the Seas, which will carry 30 per cent more passengers than Freedom is expected to arrive May 2010.

Aggressive promotion and investment in attractions have seen them attract an increasing proportion of the cruise business in Jamaica despite an overall decline in the sector. Earnings for attractions from cruise passengers in 2007 was more than three times the number in 2005, according to Jamaica Tourist Board (JTB) statistics.

What's more, higher oil prices, which contributed towards cruise corporations decision-making in moving a significant number of ships into higher premium destinations, may very well cause cruise line operators to return to the region more-than-a-year earlier than projected.

For the first five months of 2008, 588,119 cruise passengers visited the island, according to the ships' manifests, 4.5 per cent lower than during the comparative period last year.

That coupled with a lower estimate of expenditure per head used by the JTB - US$84.9 per person compared to the US$94.2 per person used in 2007 - likely means that tourism receipts from cruise tourists dropped to US$49.9 million for the five months to May 31 this year, a 14.3 per cent drop from the comparative five months last year and which represents less than seven per cent of overall tourism receipts during the period.

The trend over the last two years, however, is showing that attractions piece of the cruise earnings, which typically has been in the region of six to seven per cent of overall tourism earnings, has increased from less than 10 per cent in 2005 to nearly a quarter in 2007.

That means that the players in the attractions sub-sector would have seen their revenue more than treble over the period to approximately US$25 million last year.

"There has been an aggressive effort to enter into partnership with cruise lines," JTB deputy director of tourism marketing David Shields told the Business Observer seemingly unsurprised by the numbers that were published last week.

The change in strategic direction has been complemented by the formation of the Attractions Association of Jamaica (AAJ), whose over-45-members base, is headed by Mark Melville, who is also co-managing director of one of the island's largest attraction, Chukka Caribbean Adventure.

His take on the subsector is that despite infrastructural challenges, such as poor roads in certain areas, attractions operators are currently "looking at retooling and expanding".
"Jamaicais far more developed in terms of attractions than its Caribbean counterparts - most specialise in one area, while Jamaica is poised to market itself on its large diversity."

Indeed, attractions in Jamaica ranged from eco-tourism, whether swimming with the dolphins at Dolphin's Cove in St Ann or climbing Dunn's River Falls, to cultural, such as Outameni Experience and sports and other activities at Chukka's locations across the island.

Dolphin's Cove has been planning to expand its operations at a second site in Hanover, although the plan has been awaiting approval from the National Environment and Planning Agency (NEPA) since 2006.

"Montego Bay and Lucea needs the attraction," lamented Marilyn Burrowes, Dolphin's Cove's managing director. According to Burrowes the attraction would draw more tourist to the area, but she is unable to say when the approval will be granted.

Outameni Experience in Trelawny, a cultural attraction which takes visitors on an interactive tour through Jamaica's history starting with the Tainos (the island's first settlers) to present-day Jamaica, was launched late last year.

Mystic Mountain, an eco-tourism attraction opened this year, features a strong environmental platform spread across 100 acres of rainforest, which tourist can view from a chair-lift which takes them up to the 700-foot summit or a zip-line canopy tour. Visitors can also take a bobsled ride one kilometre of track - 700 metres down and 300m back up.
Mystic Mountain's Barbara Lulich believes there are still much more opportunities for marketing attractions.

"Experiential tourism is the new tourism," she told the Business Observer. Yet she is not restricting her marketing focus on cruise passengers alone.

"Cruise companies are superb sellers of tourism attractions at major ports of calls. It is a significant revenue centre for them," Lulich asserted. "We encourage the local hotel industry to adopt same marketing techniques."

Dolphin's Cove is evenly split between land-based and cruise, while Melville says his operations and a number of others get around half of its visitors from the cruise lines while some operators focus more on either cruise or land-based tourist. Lulich's recommendation would make land-based tourist more relevant to attractions operators.

It is not only attractions operators that are looking at retooling and repositioning themselves to capture a larger share of the market.

JTB statistics also show that tourists are spending more on straw products and wooden articles, the value of which combined totalled $12.3 million in 2007, far higher than the US$1.2 million earned in 2005.

Melody Haughton, president of Harbour Street Craft Market Association says that craft is in "high demand" describing the enterprise as a "hidden gold mine".

Her market and others that operate in the Montego Bay area are seeing improvements, not least of all through the increase in visitors passing through the market on Hot Spot Shuttle, but her association plans to bring "cultural events to the market to attract more visitors".

The plan in its current incarnation would have the market segmented into areas representing the seven national heroes and would include concerts and other cultural performances on stage.

She is currently seeking start-up capital.

The industry still lacks an economic impact study, however, which fully captures the state of cruise tourism and its players. This is one of the reasons why Melville is excited about appointment of a deputy director focusing on cruise tourism and attractions.

Newly appointed deputy director, Zachary Harding, who has responsibility for the areas, wants to facilitate the study, which the AAJ is currently contemplating.

"We don't have any format to capture data from the sector itself," Harding told the Business Observer. "One of the things I have proposed to them is that each attraction provide preliminary estimates of operational data, which everybody seems committed to. In order to operate more effectively as a lobby group, they need quantification."

Another new lobby group, the National Cruise Council of Jamaica (NCCJ), was formed recently but the association, which is headed by John Byles was formed in response to a crisis on the horizon - a protracted period of decline in cruise ship arrivals in the region.

Byles explained that higher average yields in other destinations such as the Mediterranean prompted cruise lines to move ships out of the region into premium locations on fallout in the US economy, and other factors such as the appeal of a more affordable way for American tourists - the primary target market for cruise companies - to travel Europe.

Port Authority of Jamaica (PAJ) vice-president of cruise shipping William Tatham explained that a shortened winter season to accommodate longer sailing time in premium regions, which also include Alaska, has also made it difficult for the region.

"The winter season used to run from October to May but now it starts in late November and ends in April," said Tatham.

The decline in cruise arrivals which began for the region in 2006 was initially projected to last until 2010.

Higher fuel cost, however, pushed up prices on airlift to Europe sufficiently to eat away at the benefit of launching from Barcelona, Spain, on a cruise of the Mediterranean - the cheaper option for touring Europe became less affordable.

Some industry experts are projecting that recovery will begin in 2009.

The industry is also eargerly awaiting the arrival of Royal Caribbean's Oasis of the Sea - a vessel capable of carrying 5,400 passengers - scheduled to land in Falmouth, Trelawny in May 2010 and its sister ship the Allure of the Seas by the end of 2010.

Jamaica is a marquis destination for cruise lines, according to Tatham, and has typically benefited from the introduction of newer and bigger ships, however, it is too early to say how the Oasis class will impact the raw numbers.

When Royal Caribbean deployed its Freedom class vessels, capable of carrying 4,300 passengers, and successor to the 3,100-passenger-carrying Voyager class, the cruise line in 2006 brought an additional 100,000 persons to the island over the year before.

But in 2007, while the Freedom of the Seas brought roughly the same amount of passengers as it did the year before, Rhapsody of the Seas, Voyager of the Seas and Navigator of the Seas made 22 less calls than the years before and carried nearly 70,000 persons less than the year before.

Tatham explained that cruise lines tend to use older vessels to explore new markets.

Harding is also looking at revamping the incentive schemes for attractions, which can currently benefit from duty-free status on imported equipment and a five-year tax break on investments.

The current definitions of attractions, however, make it difficult to identify ones that are entitled to the benefit.
Attractions have to charge an admission for them to qualify, which means that popular locations such as restaurants can't get the incentive under the current regime.

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