WITHIN the next month, small hotels, restaurants and attractions across the island will know which among them will benefit from a $5-million assistance package recently announced by the tourism ministry.

“Within the next 30 days we expect that the full report will be in and we’ll be ready to move,” state minister for tourism, Wykeham McNeill, told the Observer in an interview. “At the end of six months we want to be able to say we moved from x compliance and doubled it, and we feel that we can do that quickly.”

The Tourism Product Development Company (TPDCo), which has monitored industry standards over the years, is responsible for selecting the beneficiaries who will receive grants of not more than $300,000. In making the announcement in Negril last week, Tourism Minister Portia Simpson Miller said it had been hard to source the funds but promised that efforts would be made to increase the allocation in the next financial year.

When contacted by the Observer, most small hoteliers in Negril argued that $300,000 is not enough to make any significant difference for their struggling operations. Others argued that the aid package had come too late.

“I think it’s coming a little bit too late, and I don’t think $300,000 can help anybody when you look at how far down we have reached,” said owner of the Sandi San property, Sandra McLeod.

On Monday, only two of her 40 rooms were occupied, a trend that she said has been in effect for the last three months, and the winter was not much better. She now rotates her staff, in an attempt to prevent job cuts.

Assistant manager of Cocolapalm, William Vassell, also argued that $300,000 was nowhere near the amount of money small hoteliers would need to upgrade their properties and attract guests. The recently acquired Silver Sands will soon complement the 75-room property and Vassell explained that even the most minor upgrading would cost at least $100,000.

But according to McNeill, the funds are not earmarked for any major projects, but to bring industry players up to acceptable international standards, market them and hope that this will translate into more business down the road. He added that more than half of the island’s small properties are sub-standard, some for simple reasons such as the lack of trained security guards or a malfunctioning fire extinguisher.

“We have been assured that 75 to 80 per cent of them can become standards compliant within a very short time,” McNeill said. “We’re not really dealing with the major work right now, we’re dealing with the smaller ones so that everybody can get the JTB approval which people can do very quickly.”

The long-term aim is to have all industry players certified, and to keep the standards at internationally acceptable levels.

“What we want is that when we are marketing on the other side we are also marketing them (the small businesses and properties) and everybody is at international standards,” McNeill explained. “We don’t want to just market a few properties, we want to market as much as possible so we have to get everybody at that (acceptable) level.”

Once it determines what plan of action is needed for each individual beneficiary, the TPDCo will also ensure that the funds are used for the purposes specified.

“They will sit with the owners and work out something and put together a programme that will be done by the standards department and then they will then present that programme to the permanent secretary (in the tourism ministry).” McNeill said. “It’s going to be done totally empirically, based on what is needed to become standards compliant.”