The Jamaica Civil Aviation Authority (JCAA) has eliminated navigation and terminal fees for small aircraft flying to Jamaica in an attempt to boost flights and capture a US$300 million ($26.7 billion) market.

The reduction, which occurred two weeks ago, will cut total (airport and JCAA) fees by about half and will save small aircraft owners up to US$168. The waiver will not affect business jets whose millionaire owners are less price sensitive rather it is aimed at middle-class propeller aircraft (up to 12,500 pounds) owners who travel across the Caribbean.

“The whole idea is to capture some of that market,” Colonel Oscar Derby JCAA director general told the Business Observer. “It gives more choice and flexibility and we hope to see an influx of small aircraft into the island.”

Travellers have avoided Jamaica for other destinations, including the Bahamas and Dominican Republic, due to lower fees. In 2008, The Bahamas received some 45,000 small aircraft originating from the US, while Jamaica received some 2,000, stated Derby.

These aircrafts will still be required to pay airport fees which are independent of the JCAA.

“The hope is that by removing the fees that it will encourage the airports to follow,” he stated

Jamaica loses some US$300 million annually from the high fees, according to pilot and entrepreneur Jim Parker who presented at the Jamaica Civil Aviation Authority (JCAA) seminar last year.

Previously, short visits to Jamaica could cost private aircraft owners US$670 (J$59,600) or hundreds of US dollars more than regional neighbours, according to Parker.

He stated that the result was that Jamaica is not a preferred destination by the over 60,000 private aircraft which travel from the US to the Caribbean annually. “And most of that number travelling to Jamaica are the business jets and not small private aircraft,” he added in his address to some 100 stakeholders at the Hilton Hotel in Kingston.

Parker has some 900 flight hours, most logged throughout the region, in his privately owned aircraft. In response to his travels he founded Caribbean Flying Adventure, a website that details the required fees, forms and navigation for Caribbean travel.

Single-engined propeller planes including the popular Cessna Skyhawk and Diamond Da20 can easily fly without refuelling the roughly 450 nautical mile (nm) (833 kilometres [km]) journey between Miami, US and Jamaica. The Skyhawk and Da20 have a range over 696 nm (1,289 km) and 547 nm (1013 km) respectively according to the manufacturers’ specifications.

Despite Jamaica earning US$1.8 billion from visitors who came on commercial aircraft in 2008; only “about US$2 million” was earned from visitors that “came on private aircraft”, Parker estimated, which translates into US$800 a visitor.

Bahamas conversely earned some US$280 million from visitors that came on small planes. Interestingly, the Bahamas waives landing, no tie down fees, overtime customers and immigration fees and transwire fees according to Bahamas government official data. There are, however, fees for departure, landing at private airstrips and multiengine aircraft landing charges each at US$15 or less.