Based on projections from experts, Jamaica is poised to benefit greatly from this winter tourist season.

According to Tourism Minister Mr Ed Bartlett, preliminary figures for January 1 to December 7, 2024, indicate that Jamaica welcomed 2,537,990 stopover visitors. That, he said, positions the island to meet its 2024 projections of 4,271,999 total visitors generating US$4.35 billion in earnings.

“This momentum bodes well for the 2024/25 winter tourist season and brings us closer to our ambitious ‘5x5x5’ goal of attracting 5 million visitors annually and generating US$5 billion in revenue by 2025,” Mr Bartlett said in his message marking the start of the winter season on Sunday.

Word of the positive outlook for the winter tourist season had come a few weeks ago from Mr Jeremy Jones, Sandals Resorts International’s corporate director, resort operations, who told us that the Sandals group has started to see immediate results from the Jamaica Love promotion which it held two months ago.

Those forward bookings, Mr Jones said, will be carried through to the end of the traditional winter tourist season early next year.

We have also seen impressive growth in air seats with United Airlines declaring in June a 50 per cent increase in flights to Jamaica since 2019; Avelo Airlines starting new direct flights between Hartford, Connecticut, and Montego Bay on November 16; JetBlue stating that it will provide 30,000 additional seats to Jamaica over the winter season; LATAM, Latin America’s largest carrier, resuming non-stop flights between Lima, Peru, and Montego Bay on December 1; new Spanish airline World2Fly set to begin rotations in summer 2025 from Lisbon, Portugal, to Montego Bay; regional airline Bahamasair commencing twice-weekly flights between Nassau and Montego Bay last month; and starting this Friday, LIAT 20 is scheduled to begin direct flights between Jamaica and Antigua.

Add to that the completion of approximately 2,000 new hotel rooms in 2024 alone and you get a picture of the industry’s buoyancy that continues to gain investor confidence even as there is a bit of fallout from recent protests by some hotel workers.

As we have said in this space before, the issues that have created angst among the workers must be resolved as quickly as possible as there are too many Jamaicans who depend on tourism for a living.

At last check, official data showed that tourism provides direct employment for approximately 175,000 Jamaicans, while another 354,000 benefit from indirect employment.

Given the rate of expansion of the sector, those numbers will increase significantly in short order. That therefore tells us that this is an industry that needs to be protected and improved as the benefits flow to both citizens and the State.

Credit for the industry’s performance over the years must go to our State tourism officials, private sector players who continue to promote the island with great zeal, the workers who extend the traditional warm Jamaican welcome to our visitors, and, indeed, the visitors who choose to come here.

We join them in welcoming the visitors who have already booked their holiday in Jamaica for this winter and encourage those who are still weighing their options to come, enjoy our beautiful island, our culture, our culinary delights, and our wonderful people.