by Brian Major
Last updated: 5:30 PM ET, Wed June 15, 2016
PHOTO: Jamaica's government will "focus on new products" as part of a plan to energize the country's visitor arrivals. At YS Falls in Jamaica's St. Elizabeth parish. (photo by Brian Major)
Three months after returning to his present position as Jamaica's tourism minister, Edmund Bartlett this week set lofty visitor arrival goals for the Caribbean destination. The minister issued a "five-pillar strategy" to increase arrivals to five million annually by 2021.
In an address in Jamaica's Parliament Tuesday, Bartlett said Jamaica's tourism sector, which last year hosted 2.1 million visitors and has recorded more than two million visitors in each of the past two years, has underperformed.
He said Jamaica is training 87 district constables under a "new initiative to ensure strict enforcement of the rule of law and effectively address tourist harassment." The constables would have policing powers and focus on resort areas.
"To preserve our reputations as a destination in which crime against tourists is negligible, we will be doing much more to preserve the safety and security of our visitors," he said.
"However, the efforts of the government must be augmented by the private security framework which hotels and other properties have as security is everyone's responsibility."
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