CTC.

WAS HELD IN BARBADOS WITH THE REPRESENTATION OF 33 COUNTRIES OF THE CARIBBEAN

The conference received a great number of meetings with decisive people for the development of the area.

According to Jean Holder, CTO General Secretary, there are topics that cannot be solved solely by tourism ministers and it is indispensable the cooperation of other elements as investment, air access, human resources development, fiscal incentives, insurance and marketing. The problems affecting the region are many and those involved in the Caribbean tourism industry have seen how the figures of visitors this year have not grown but dropped in some countries. While cruiser industry develops in a fast way, airlines are facing permanent difficulties to fly to certain countries. As a result of these concerns, CTO has established in this framework, a Committee on Cruiser Tourism and another of Aviation. Another important decision taken in CTC was the election of The Bahamas as CTO president for the year 2001, since Barbados has held this position since 1997. Dominican Republic was reelected as the first vice president, trusting that this position contributes that Latin-American countries have more weight in the organization, since there is certain concern about the fact that CTO is largely Anglo-Saxon. In the field of marketing, a plan of three years was devised with US$3.4 million with the governments of the Caribbean and the private sector, almost a million dollars has been requested already for concrete programs. These plans will be appointed including that of the Caribbean, North America, the United Kingdom and Europe. Michael Youngman, the CTO Marketing Director announced that the objective is to place more emphasis on Europe and the Caribbean markets, thus supporting this strategy in the new CTO web site: doitcaribbean.

Havana’s International Fair FIHAV 2000

Over 1,500 exhibitors of 64 countries, the scheduled visit of some 20 official delegations and the signing of important contracts were the scenario of the recently concluded 18th Havana’s International Fair.

The system of “ventanilla única” has been set up to speed up businesses and to reduce the time from one year to thirty days for arrangements and registration for their establishment in Cuba, for their operations, according to the law. The agreement was signed between the Chamber of Commerce of the Republic of Cuba at FIHAV 2000 and the National Office for Foreign Investment. The opening of the Cuban office of the Italian Institute for Foreign Trade (ICE) was another important aspect. This Italian entity is dedicated to the promotion of foreign trade in Cuba and will support the Italian enterprises that come to Cuba to do business and others which are already established in the large island. The results of the prize ceremony were 14 Gold Medals granted to Quality for the Cuban products. The other 26 medals were distributed among firms of 15 countries.

Antonio Luis Carricarte, President of the Chamber of Commerce of Cuba "The 18th edition of the International Fair of Havana, has been a reassurance of the confidence that the world entrepreneurs have on the Cuban economy," said Antonio Luis Carricarte, President of the Chamber of Commerce of Cuba to Excellences magazine in an exclusive interview for the magazine." "Spain was the country with the largest presence at the Fair, this is an indication of the interest of establishing and maintaining businesses in Cuba. FIHAV is consolidated as one of the most important meetings of Cuba and of the region and thus in the framework of this event, we are announcing other fairs that in their own context has quite a significance as EXPOCARIBE and FIMAR.

Wtm 2000-london, nothing new

From November 13-16, one of the most significant events on tourism in Europe, the World Travell Market, was held at Earls Court. The countries there represented brought nothing new. CTO (Caribbean Tourism Organization) presented its new web "Doitcaribbean" with which is aimed at providing more information for all member countries of this organization.The magazine Excellences attended the event.

A cozy booth of 16 m2, decorated with a tropical furniture and with the presence of elegant hostesses, represented Caribbean Tourism Excellences magazine in this new edition of Havana’s International Fair. Many were the persons who visited the booth and praised the products there exhibited. Twenty-eight hostesses, distributed different issues of the publishing group all over the pavilions and to visitors, along with the Special Supplement dedicated to this event that was an indispensable guide to tour the wide fair grounds. It is worthy of mention that the new publishing product Diplomatic Excellences was highly welcome. Caribbean Tourism Excellences visited in the Fair, Iberia representatives and the Spanish booths, held meetings with the main leaders of Cubana de Aviación, Ibercub, Apiculture National Enterprise (APISUN), CUTISA, UGAO Group, Intercer, Habanos S.A., Brascuba, Suchel Unión and the other branches: Bucanero, GENIX and Conavana. Caribbean Tourism Excellences was also present in the announcement of other fairs to be held: FIMAR and EXPOCARIBE next year. The main purpose of Excellences magazine in FIHAV was to turn the Caribbean into the multidestination that received travelers of the main issuing countries of the world.