St Vincent and the Grenadines to receive 326k cruise passengers for the 2022 cruise season
St. Vincent and the Grenadines anticipates approximately 305 booked cruise visits, of which 12 are inaugural stops.
Minister of Tourism Carlos James said on Thursday that the island anticipates approximately 326,000 passengers.
“This is well over a quarter million passengers this year. And from my checks, it will appear that it will be a record year in terms of our number of passenger arrivals for cruises in Saint Vincent and the Grenadines”.
“So, what that says to us is that it represents a 29% increase in cruise calls from our pre-pandemic numbers or benchmark year 2018,” she said. We’re now at 29% more calls than we had before the pandemic and a 44% increase in cruise passenger arrivals in terms of our projections from the benchmark year of 2018, 2019″.
According to James, based on all indications, this is a respectable performance in terms of the ministry’s efforts during the pandemic.
“Even I was closely involved in the conversations with cruise lines and government relations people to guarantee that Saint Vincent and the Grenadines remained a desirable destination despite the COVID-19 outbreak and the volcanic eruption of La Soufriere”.
According to James, this will likely be the most successful year for the SVG’s cruise industry in the past twenty years. However, notwithstanding the figures, many more calls might have been made to the destination.
“One of the challenges we had was the limitations we had at our cruise terminal. We were unable to dock three or four vessels per day. In fact, there are some cruise lines that wanted to come into St Vincent and the Grenadines at a particular time, but because that slot was already booked and given to another cruise line, it became challenging for us to accommodate a number of cruise lines that would want to come on the same day in terms of the schedule calls”.
James stated that it would be more convenient to have a larger terminal that can accommodate three, four, or five vessels simultaneously, and he is pleased that the construction of the cargo terminal has begun further west of Kingstown, which will free up a significant amount of space in the east of Kingstown and in central Kingstown, allowing for the expansion of the current cruise terminal.
