Saint Lucia celebrates World Tourism Day 2022

Saint Lucia: Tuesday, September 27, 2022, has been designated by the United Nations World Tourism Organization (UNWTO), as World Tourism Day, under the theme “Rethinking Tourism”. According to Zurab Pololikashvili, Secretary General of the UNWTO, “Tourism’s relevance has never been clearer. The time is now to seize this opportunity to rethink how we do tourism”.

Against this backdrop, the Ministry of Tourism, Investment, Creative Industries, Culture and Information has earmarked the following in observance of World Tourism Day:

1. Address by Minister of Tourism
2. Address by Junior Minister of Tourism
3. The official launch of Community Tourism, sub-theme “Tourism Comes To Your Community”;
4. Industry Perspectives on the theme “Rethinking Tourism”;
5. Call to industry to wear BLUE in observance of World Tourism Day

Given the challenges fronted by the industry of tourism due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Ministry of Tourism embraces the theme “Rethinking Tourism” and sees it as an urgent appeal for re-evaluating the methodologies used to operate within the industry, thus challenging industry stakeholders and operators to be more creative and innovative in the approach to ensure more widespread economic benefits to citizens.

The purpose behind the celebration of the World Tourism Day is to raise awareness about the importance of tourism within the international community. Along with this, it also highlights tourism sector as one of the major source of income for island countries, including Saint Lucia, the Commonwealth of Dominica, Maldives and Malta. Along with this, the sector also supports the economy of large countries, such as the USA, UK, India and Canada.

The day will hold more significance after decrease of COVID-19 pandemic as the deadly virus focuses everyone to stay in their houses for more than a year.