Minister of Tourism Cecil McKie said on Monday that St Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG) has received full marks for the hosting of the 2019 Caribbean Conference on Sustainable Tourism (STC2019).

The conference, which was held under the theme “Keeping the Right Balance: Tourism Development in an Era of Diversification” was held at the Beachcombers hotel in Villa last week. The three-day event ended last Friday.

At a press conference on Monday at the Carnival Development Corporation’s (CDC) conference room, McKie said SVG hosted the STC for the first time and the organisers were able to involve several of this country’s ministries and ministers of government. This, he said, was very important as it is a clear indication that the conference had the full support of the government.
The annual Caribbean Conference on Sustainable Tourism Development is part of the information dissemination and regional awareness component of Caribbean Tourism Organisation’s (CTO) Strategy for Sustainable Tourism.

Some of the topics addressed at the conference were developing modes for social integration, community based tourism, destination SVG (where we are able to showcase what we are doing here, geothermal renewable energy, medicinal marijuana and other things), how we have recovered after disasters and celebrating our past while embracing our future.

McKie said SVG was also able to look at issues of heritage and how we are able to use those to grow our tourism product. He said another important topic was the caring economy and conservation and a forum where stakeholders were allowed them to participate and give their input.

“The numbers at this year’s conference were outstanding,” said McKie who noted that 62 persons came from abroad while 73 local persons participated.