ROSE HALL, St James — Tourism Minister Edmund Bartlett is fearful that the recent downgrade of the US economy by Standards & Poor’s (S&P) could trigger a decline of visitor arrivals from that destination as well as put the brakes on American investment here.

S&P’s has recently downgraded the US credit rating from its prestigious AAA rating to AA+.

“US is our most important source market for tourism and the effect of any further erosion in the economic position in that market will be a reduction in arrivals and the slowing of investment activities from that destination to us here in Jamaica,” Bartlett argued.

US visitors accounted for most of the over 2.9 million visitors who were welcomed to the island last year. The US market is also heavily relied upon to realise the three million visitors projected to arrive on the local shores this year.

Bartlett was, however, quick to assure stakeholders in the industry that his ministry’s proactive approach to diversify the tourism market which resulted in the courting of emerging markets in South America and Eastern Europe, could serve to cushion the effect that any fallout in the US markets may precipitate.

“We had looked far beyond this possibility from as far as last year and strategically have been moving to diversify our market and to the emerging economies particularly in South America; Brazil, and the satellite countries around Brazil, Argentina , Chile, Colombia and Equador. In Eastern Europe; Russia and Poland,” Bartlett noted.

He further noted: ” So we want our partners and stakeholders to know that we are not unmindful of the economic trends that are surfacing in our key source markets but we want the nation to understand that we already had been taking steps to mitigate the impact of it by market diversification”.

Meanwhile, the tourism minister explained that airlifts will pose a major challenge in efforts to attract visitors from emerging Asian markets.

Bartlett who was speaking Sunday night to members of the media in Rose Hall, where he staged a free concert for members of his East Central St James constituency, argued that the tourism ministry will continue their aggressive marketing in the “mature, advanced economies”.

“Those destinations are still very strong and we expect that there is going to be a good share of the market that we can take away from because of our connectivity,” Bartlett argued .

He added: “Canada will of course be the centrepiece of our efforts because Canada is our strongest growth market and for this winter we are expecting a strong pull from Canada as well”.