The Tribune

By NATARIO McKENZIE

Tribune Business Reporter

nmckenzie@tribunemedia.net

The Minister of Tourism was yesterday optmistic that the second Bahamas Junkanoo Carnival festival attracted more visitors than in 2015, and that it remained within budget.

Speaking to the media outside the Cabinet Office, Obie Wilchcombe said: “Right now, its success is going to be assessed. Based on the participation of the Bahamians, it certainly was a big event. We wanted more visitors and I think we achieved that. The exact numbers we’re not sure of yet. In the post-mortem we will look at all the numbers.”

He added: “I think next year is the mature year when we should see it rise to the numbers we want. We knew the hotels were full, we knew the planes coming in were filled, we knew people had a good time. How Bahamians fared in so far as their return on investment. we believe it was good but we have to assess.”

“We had more visitors here this year, more participation. We had people from the cruise lines participating. We had many Americans, African-Americans who came in, many Caribbean people who came in.

“Like I said, it is a work in progress. You have to keep working to get to the point where it can become one of the renowned carnivals in the world. We have put Junkanoo with it, and with that special combination we expect to be unique and be the best.”

Bahamas Junkanoo Carnival organisers last year admitted that issues with securing a headline act for the event had severely hampered international marketing efforts, although they said a more “focused” approach had been taken this year event.

Roughly 900 tourists attended the event in Nassau last year, with the estimated spend derived from that group pegged at $1.7 million. In Grand Bahama, it was tallied at $2.8 million due to some 1,200 cruise ship passengers and 300 crew being bused to the kick-off festivities on that island.

As to whether the 2016 event was on budget, Mr Wilchcombe said: “The Ministry of Finance was determined that they stuck within their budget and I believe that the authorities did just that.

“You also had some major donations. BTC was major sponsor with $1 million, which was very significant. I believe they stuck within the budget but we will have to wait and see.”

Bahamas Carnival Band Owners Association chief, Dario Terelli, told Tribune Business that 2016 surpassed expectations in terms of local and international participation.

“Saturday was very successful for us for the second year. It surpassed our expectations from last year in terms of locals and international persons coming,” Mr Terelli said.

“I am waiting on the bands right now, but by Thursday we will have a report on how many revellers there were, especially from abroad. We are speculating that we had more than 2,000 persons from abroad that came in based on the conversation with the band owners.”

Mr Terelli added: “We know we had more foreign participation by our records and our sales. I can say that 95 per cent of the bookings, whether it was local or international, was done online.

“This is an Internet-driven business where social media is fuelling exposure for the Bahamas. We consider ourselves direct sales persons for the country. We’re helping to put heads in beds and that’s the objective of this event apart from creating local entrepreneurs.”