The Caribbean will enjoy steady growth in its all-important tourism sector as the U.S. economy continues its recovery, but serious issues — ranging from violent crime in some destinations like the Bahamas and Trinidad to the widely despised U.K. air passenger duty — could prevent the region from realizing its full potential in 2014.
José J. Villamil, one of Puerto Rico’s leading economists, offered a grim assessment of the island’s fiscal health during a lecture Tuesday at Washington’s Center for Strategic & International Studies.
Up to 40 percent of Cuba’s labor force is already working in the private sector, making the country a largely middle-class society and discrediting the notion that Fidel and Raúl Castro must die before real economic change can occur on the island.
Mexican aviation executive Agustín Arellano wants to transform Puerto Rico’s flagship airport from an obsolete relic of the mid-20th century into a modern world-class gateway — much like he’s done for Cancún and eight other airports throughout southeastern Mexico.
Last year was a gloomy one for the U.S. Virgin Islands, with fewer cruise ships calling on St. Thomas and St. Croix. Yet 2013 is looking very good so far — particularly when it comes to air arrivals, which are at their highest levels since the mid-1990s.
The St. Maarten Tourism Bureau says arrivals to the Dutch-speaking destination jumped by 17 percent in 2012 compared to the year before — aided by JetBlue’s new direct service from Puerto Rico and weekly Delta flights from New York to St. Maarten.
The 32-island nation of St. Vincent & the Grenadines will mark a milestone early next year, when Argyle International Airport opens for business.
WASHINGTON — Puerto Rico’s iconic Arecibo Observatory is looking to raise money and boost its international profile as the world’s largest single-dish radio telescope prepares to celebrate its 50th anniversary this October.
The 2013 tourism outlook for Jamaica appears mixed, particularly with regard to cruise-ship arrivals, though the island has seen an increase in airlift from new markets like Russia, while several new megaprojects could give the industry a boost.
Nearly 680,000 Americans, including 15,649 residents of Puerto Rico, owe their jobs to bilateral trade and investment between the Netherlands and the United States.
Despite a U.S. State Department travel advisory warning Haiti-bound Americans about violent crime, infectious diseases and substandard medical facilities, several large tourism projects are proceeding as planned in the Western Hemisphere’s poorest country.
Cheddi Jagan International Airport is about to undergo a dramatic transformation that will enable Guyana’s only air link to the outside world to receive larger, heavier aircraft — boosting direct passenger traffic to and from Europe and North America.
In March 1913, a German daredevil named George Schmidt made local history when he flew his monoplane over Georgetown, dropping messages from the sky.
With just over 10 million people, the Dominican Republic is the second-largest Caribbean nation after Cuba. But the D.R. is clear and away the regional leader when it comes to tourism. In 2012, more than 4.56 million tourists visited the country by air, a 5.9 percent increase over the year before. Of the total, just under 639,000 were non-resident Dominicans abroad.
Economic difficulties in Curaçao — the largest Dutch-speaking island in the recently dissolved Netherlands Antilles confederation — as well as political uncertainty in nearby Venezuela, are affecting retailers ahead of a planned hike in the country’s sales tax on luxury products such as perfumes, jewelery and electronics from 6 percent to 9 percent.
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