Jamaica to host big tourism conference next year
ROSE HALL, St James — Jamaica is slated to host 157 ministers of tourism from across the world during the inaugural United Nations (UN) Global Conference on Tourism Development to be held at the Montego Bay Convention Centre next year December.
“Next year, 2017, has been declared by the United Nations as The International Year for Sustainable Tourism Development and little Jamaica has been selected as the venue for the first global conference on tourism development and sustainability,” Bartlett announced.
“And the development agencies of the UN will also be here in those discussions to look at the future of tourism and the development strategies that must go hand in hand with that.”
Bartlett explained that the conference will represent the first time that both the private and public sector arm of the United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) will jointly host a global event.
He was speaking to members of the media following the opening the Gastronomy of Fats and Oils seminar, put on by Seprod in partnership with the Ministry of Tourism, at the Hilton Rose Hall Resort and Spa last week.
The tourism minister argued that the upcoming UN conference will provide a glorious opportunity to display authentic Jamaican food and cuisine to the visiting delegations, which will not only include the 157 tourism ministers, but representatives from “500 companies that are in tourism services and provisions”.
“We are excited by it. This is an opportunity for gastronomy for the health and wellness network, particularly for the entertainment and music side to really shine, because Jamaica’s food will be on display,” Bartlett, who is also chairman of the Affiliates Committee, UNWTO, remarked.
He argued that “to build out gastronomy is to create a very new dynamic and distinctive stream of visitors into Jamaica”.
“Eighty-eight per cent of the people who go to other places go in search of food, and in our largest market, the United States, 23.7 million people travel every year for gastronomy experience. Jamaica could do with two million of that,” Bartlett remarked.
