Cheap airline tickets to rescue Caribbean Tourism
Monday, June 30th, 2008The ever increasing cost of jet fuel and the softness of American Economy together are posing a major threat to Caribbean tourism. Many of the tiny islands on the Caribbean depend almost entirely on tourism for their sustenance. Airline fares are soaring and the number of flights declining sharply and the flow of vacationers into this island nation is getting choked. Are cheap airline tickets a remedy for the Caribbeans?

The carefree beaches and the colonial cities of the Caribbean together attracted over 15 million visitors over the last year. The vulnerability of the Caribbean is even more pronounced because of the near monopoly enjoyed by one airline, the American. Of all the passengers who travelled through Puerto Rico in the last year, American carried over 60% of them. The Caribbeans have invested large sums of money into tourism and they need more inflow of tourists – vacationers, certainly not less, because less would not only hit the bottom-line, but also potentially threaten even their very existence. Cheap airline tickets offer a huge relief to this agonising scenario.
The Caribbean cruise is equally famous and lesser flights into Puerto Rico can mean lesser people seeking cruise holidays. The Cruise ship industry would also take a beating for no fault of theirs. Every action has a reaction! Nobody has ever told the world so far, as to why the oil prices are galloping like the horses on the race course. Economists, forecasters, and all that ‘informed’ lot of people busy themselves preparing velocity charts and all those exhibition pieces.
If all these are bad news for the Caribbeans, there is some good news too. Working against the trend JetBlue Airways Corporation and Virgin Atlantic are planning to add more flights to Puerto Rico ex.New York, Boston and Orlando. Some of these Airlines hold the view that their younger fleet would to some extent offset the increase in oil price due to enhanced fuel efficiency.
In the middle of all these the silver lining in the cloud for the Carribeans is the strengthening Euro against the dollar making European Vacation packages to the Caribbean more attractive. The developed world should still take the responsibility to reign in the oil prices, for the world to prosper.




