Several hotels, resorts seeking expansion permission - Da Silva Market study to be done By Miranda La Rose Stabroek News January 10, 2000 A number of hotels and resorts have applied for permission to expand their facilities and for duty-free concessions for building materials, indicating an increase in interest in the tourism sector, Minister of Tourism, Geoffrey Da Silva, says. In a telephone interview with Stabroek News Da Silva said that the ministry was at present evaluating the applications and making recommendations to the Ministry of Finance. Applications for expansion and refurbishment have been submitted for Radisson Suites, Ariantze Hotel and Cara Lodge in Georgetown. The Cara Inn, formerly the Ambassador's Club, which has been taken over by the Cara chain of hotels, will also be refurbished. It is scheduled for opening in May. Other hotels with plans to expand and refurbish are Lord's Hotel on the Essequibo Coast, Xenon Hotel at Charity on the Pomeroon River and the Savannah Inn at Lethem in the Rupununi. Resorts which have made formal applications for expansion are Arrow Point in the Kamuni Creek and Splashmins and Marudi Creek on the Linden/Soesdyke Highway. The ministry, in conjunction with the private sector will continue its training programme for entrepreneurs and persons operating in the public sector. The programme for this year begins with a seminar for 25 private and public sector officials starting today at the Ocean View Hotel and Convention Centre. The seminar, organised by the Tourism and Hospitality Association of Guyana (THAG) and sponsored by the Caribbean Programme for Economic Competitiveness (CPEC), will look at the issue of developing the tourism product and marketing. Eight of the participants of the seminar will be selected to take part in programmes in the Caribbean and Central America. Executive Director of THAG, Indira Anandjit, will take part in an overseas training programme and a senior tutor of the Carnegie School of Home Economics will be trained at the Barbados Hospitality School later in the year. Da Silva said that government and the public sector needed to sit down with resort owners and tour operators and decide what the focus for the year would be. As regards the establishment of the tourism authority, he said that the draft legislation, modelled after the Barbadian Act, was before Cabinet and being discussed by a sub-committee. Even if it was not passed before the elections, he said, he was optimistic that it would be tabled in parliament before it was dissolved. Not giving any reasons for the delay in getting the former Chess Hall renovated to house the Tourism Authority, he said that funding through the European Union was available. At present, he said, everyone, including the international funding agencies, were awaiting the establishment of the Tourism Authority to move the industry forward. With regard to marketing, he said that the intention for now was to focus on the Caribbean and North America as primary markets and Europe as a secondary market leaving Brazil as "an opportunity market. We are looking to see what we can do there to increase the number of visitors from Brazil, especially from Boa Vista, coming to Guyana." A large part of the tourists being targeted, he said, were overseas-based Guyanese. Of importance right now, Da Silva said, was a market study for the eco-tourism product which Guyana has to offer. "It would not be wise to attempt to market without doing a study. We must know before hand what other people--beyond the overseas-based Guyanese--would like; whether they just want to enjoy a real forest or want to enjoy sporting facilities, such as game fishing at an eco-tourism resort and what they are willing to pay." THAG, he said, was asking government to fund the establishment of a marketing company but the market study was important to understand how to market. Such a study, Da Silva felt, could be completed within a two- to three-month period. Reflecting on the tourism industry last year, Da Silva said that though modest, the ministry made a difference in terms of making the local population more aware and more appreciative of the opportunities available. This, he said, was gauged from responses in the media and from feedback at the level of the ministry from the ordinary people. However, when the work in the industry over the past ten years was evaluated, he said, "we, in Guyana have still not reached a point of take-off but there is increased activity and new people now want to come into the sector." The crowning event for last year was the Caribbean Tourism Organisation (CTO) sustainable tourism conference which was held in May in Georgetown. Benefits from the conference, he said, would be visible in the long term as it attracted leading persons in the industry not only from the Caribbean but from further afield. The conference document, he said, was still to be printed and videos were being produced. As soon as Guyana received these, Da Silva said, they would be disseminated for use in schools and at public seminars. The CTO, he said, has promised to send them to Guyana as soon as they become available. In addition, he noted that the economic impact study, begun last year with funding from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), was to be completed this year. Although statistics were not yet available, Da Silva said that indications were that tourist arrivals had increased last year, as against the year before. However, the figure was not likely to reach that achieved in 1994 when arrivals peaked for the decade. He said that there were more bookings throughout the year at the hotels and resorts and many overseas-based Guyanese, who in previous years only visited the city or the coast, had ventured into the hinterland. Whitewater Tours, he said, reported being completely booked for the Christmas season. Other resorts had bookings from overseas visitors and from Guyanese at home which they did not expect. The main objective, however, was to promote a positive image of the country, he said, adding that "our reality is better than the negative image which many people try to paint." He also commended persons for the material which they have produced highlighting the beauty of the country. They include Sheik Hassan of Sheik Hassan Productions who has produced a number of posters featuring the flora, fauna, historical sites and cultures of the Guyanese people; Bhaskar Sharma for his television documentary In God's Own Country and Cathy Hughes of Video-Mega Productions, who has produced a second 15-minute video on Guyana, which is to be launched shortly. Follow the goings-on in Guyana in Guyana Today