St. Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG) expects the new, $240 million Argyle International Airport to become operational in early 2013. The opening of Argyle International Airport, located on the eastern side of the island of St. Vincent, will allow direct international jet service to SVG for the first time and will offer a five-fold increase in passenger capacity over the 32 Caribbean islands’ existing airport, says Glen Beache, chief executive officer of the St. Vincent and the Grenadines Tourism Authority.

At a meeting of the Commerce Department's Travel and Tourism Advisory Board, Commerce Secretary Gary Locke announced a 47 percent surge in the travel and tourism trade surplus in 2010; the surplus now exceeds $28 billion. The United States welcomed more than 55 million international visitors during the first 11 months of 2010, 11.4 million more visitors than the year before.

The Dominican Republic’s Ministry of Tourism is pleased to announce that the country welcomed over four million visitors in 2010, a new record  and a 3.3 percent increase over 2009. The U.S. is Dominican Republic’s largest market for tourism with over one million U.S. visitors choosing the second largest Caribbean island nation as a vacation destination for six consecutive years. Overall, there was an increase of 83,022 visitors (54 percent) from North America compared to the previous year.

Figures recently released by the government’s statistics department show a very strong growth in Montserrat’s tourism arrivals for the first half of 2010. For the period January to July 2010, total arrivals grew by close to 22 percent.

Jamaica’s tourism minister Edmund Bartlett is “hopeful” that the banding for Air Passenger Duty could be changed at next month’s UK budget. Bartlett, speaking in London, said he welcomed comments from Justine Greening, the coalition government’s economic secretary to the Treasury, who acknowledged the strong ties “that exist between the UK and the Caribbean countries”.

UNWTO is a key partner of the recently established Global Partnership for Sustainable Tourism, an initiative to connect all stakeholders working or interested in working to develop sustainable tourism (Costa Rica, 21 January 2011).UNWTO Partners with UNEP, Other Key Players to Boost Sustainable Tourism