Like other countries around the world, Barbados has had to change the way it operates during the COVID-19 pandemic. But the news appears to be good, and the island nation is using this down time to re-examine its tourism marketing, refurbish hotels and look at how to make Barbados a centre for summer cruising.
Barbados Tourism Minister Kerrie Symonds was a guest on the TravelPulse Canada 1 on 1 Facebook Live series on Monday, chatting with Editor in Chief John Kirk about what's happening on the island now and what the future holds.
"It is a tough period that we're going through," he said. "The island is under a 24-hour curfew so it's virtually a lockdown Certainly between the hours of 6 p.m. and 6 a.m. there's no movement allowed except for the most exceptional circumstances. Between 6 a.m. and 6 p.m. people are allowed to go about essential business .... such as going to the supermarket.
"Beaches are off limits; parks are off-limits. There's no recreational assembly of any kind, so people do their religious worshipping on line, and that has been the case since I think around the 20th of March, and currently that's intended to continue up until the 3rd of May, at which point a review will be undertaken and we'll decide what happens next."
Symmonds said Barbadians are in good spirits despite the changes.
"The spirit of camaraderie is high. People are making facemasks and making sure the elderly get them. Donations for food for those people who have been dislocated" are being made, too.
Symmonds said there have been 75 cases of COVID-19 on the island.
"Yesterday we had our fourth consecutive days of no new cases announced. So, I think we've come to the point where it would be fair to say we seem to be plateauing. But it's too early to roll back the safety net. We have to continue the things we've been doing. We did 35 tests yesterday ... and we've had zero positives on that."
Symmonds said there have five deaths in Barbados and 1,000 to 1,200 tests.
"There's no indication of a community spread in Barbados (which has a population of 300,000) and that is very good news."
"We have to maintain our guard and make sure we can come to a point where perhaps in the next week or two, if we don't have any more new cases and we can start to do some random testing across the community just to be doubly sure, and if we can do let's say 100 to 200 tests a day, then the medical health professionals feel ... we could relax some of the restrictions."
Symmonds said Barbados authorities saw the dangers of COVID-19 around the world and acted early. The country also was able to get help from the International Monetary Fund. Special relief packages have been approved for people who are out of work and there also are private-public partnerships, he said.
"We have an "adopt a family" program so if people are on the borderline and falling under it, then effectively what we've been able to do is bring in the private sector to adopt that family and help them get through this tough period."
Asked about Barbados' strategy for a recovery, Symmonds said Barbados Tourism Marketing Inc. is looking at a repositioning of the Barbados brand.
"We've taken a conscious decision to use this period as a period where we can do a reassessment of our industry, the way we have done business historically and traditionally, and where we can identify substantial improvements and so on. We've done a number of things. First of all, there's a look at how we can reposition the Barbados brand and keep it top of mind awareness across all the major source markets. One of the things we have done is set aside funds at the government level, I think $20 to $30 million, and then there will be a blending of financing with the private sector so as to be able to re-capitalize what we call the Small Hotel Redevelopment Fund, and that fund will be to enable a lot of hotels to refresh themselves and use this down period" to do renovations and reconstruction.
"We've created a tourism recovery task force," he said. "We will come together for our first online meeting tomorrow. That's purposed not only with looking at ways we recover but .... the product of Barbados as a whole. The first two weeks of this period was spent looking at a blueprint ...which looked at everything in Barbados; the attractions, the restaurants, the hotels, the way in which other areas of the economy link into tourism; the cultural sector, the agricultural sector, the sporting sector. And the way in which we can make this ow make a better experience, whether it's health, wellness or whatever.
Also looking at way they recover in the cruise sector of the market, Symmonds said.
"Even as I speak to you there are 10 or 12 cruise ships anchored off the coast of Barbados because they had nowhere else to go. We facilitated the repatriation of the passengers, but the ships are still out there. It has helped us to develop a warm kinship and a sense of fraternity with that sector.
"We were perhaps their greatest friend. We are looking at the way we can perhaps work with them so that when there's a recovery period we can be at the centrepiece of that recovery. And there some things we would want to do for the rest of the region, the eastern Caribbean. And one of those is to create a summer cruise itinerary, so that instead of the Mediterranean being the only place to be for major cruise activity out of Europe, we would want to think that now we can have a look at the southeast Caribbean and have Barbados as the centrepiece of that itinerary."
Asked if he had a message for agents, Symmonds said the country is using this down time "to formulate big plans and to bounce back, and not just to come back by ourselves but as part of a stronger and more prepared Caribbean region, and a safer Caribbean region. A lot of the things we're talking about here in terms of looking at the standards we offer to visitors is something we would want to share with the rest of the region. One major one is to have a COVID-free Barbados, and in that regard we're looking at a pre-molecular test which would be a test that, if we can get it put together, would be done on entry into the island so you know you're coming onto island where you know there's no disease. Similarly, we'd like to spearhead an effort to have that in the Eastern Caribbean as a whole."
"We are obviously anxious to re-open ourselves to business, but it has to be done in a way that's safe for the visiting public and also the local public," Symmonds said.
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