Despite the destruction as a result of Hurricane Irma, a silver lining seems to have been found as it relates to the tourism product of The Bahamas. According to Tourism and Aviation Minister Dionisio D’Aguilar, funds have been redirected to fuel a major marketing scheme for the country.
Hurricane Irma has come and gone and left its mark. However New Providence along with several other islands were spared this time around.
Not disregarding those who were gravely impacted, Mr. D’Aguilar said efforts are now in motion to redirect funds to pump a marketing campaign that will draw tourists to those islands that weathered the storm almost completely unscathed.
“We had very little damage to our major tourism destinations such as New Providence, Freeport, Abaco and Eleuthera. That’s the primary function of the ministry of tourism now because everybody is hearing destruction in the Caribbean, hurricane went through The Bahamas and they are thinking the entire nation was affected. They don’t realize that we are an island nation and some islands were affected and some islands were not,” he said.
“Tourism is a mercenary business, so where some of the tourism destinations were wiped out. As sad as it may seem, that creates opportunities for us.”
The tourism minister also spoke to the impact of those inbound flights from Florida and other destinations that had to be rerouted.
“We may not get the money now, but I think it’s just going to be shifted further down which is fine, because September is a relatively slow month for tourism anyway. Hopefully those people would just shift their holidays, possibly two weeks further down the calendar,” the tourisms minister said.
“So I’m hopeful that people will come once they learn that the Bahamas is back and open for business they will simply just rebook and come later.”
Furthermore, Mr. D’Aguilar told reporters he and his team have no regrets about urging tourists to evacuate as safety was of the most importance.
“You have to assume the worst because everybody would be the first to criticize you did not take decisive action, ” said the minister.
