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The Greater
Caribbean This Week: Risky Business |
 By:
Jasmin Garraway, the Director of
Sustainable Tourism of the Association of Caribbean States.
December 14, 2007: The vulnerability of tourism to
risk, crisis and disaster has long been evident. History in
fact shows that the industry has been affected by a range of
disasters: Biological, Man-made, Technological and
disastrous natural occurrences, several of which are
indelibly printed in the minds of Tourism stake-holders
world over.
The Indian Ocean tsunami of 2004 left more than 3,500
tourist casualties, and an estimated overall death toll
surpassing 280,000. Such devastation is now referred to as
‘the greatest catastrophe ever recorded in the history of
world tourism’.
No region on the globe is immune from the risk of the
occurrence of a disaster. The Greater Caribbean is visited
by the precursors of disaster every year in the form of
tropical storms and hurricanes. The location of the
territories makes their vulnerability to certain natural
hazards inevitable. The Caribbean lies in the North Atlantic
Ocean, one of the six main tropical areas of the Earth where
hurricanes may develop from June to December every year.
Several of the islands of the Eastern Caribbean are volcanic
in origin. The only known submarine volcano in the region -
Kick 'em Jenny – places Grenada and the rest of the Eastern
Caribbean in jeopardy of a tsunami should a major
under-water volcanic eruption occur. Many countries in the
region lie close to tectonic plate boundaries and the level
of seismicity is considered to moderate to severe; they thus
face the threat of earthquakes. All the countries of the
Greater Caribbean are therefore, to some extent, vulnerable
to the impact of geological and hydro-meteorological
hazards.
Over the past three decades, the region has made an economic
commitment to satisfying international demand for beach
vacations by providing a coastal tourism product. The World
Bank estimates that the typical tourism development in the
Caribbean is located on the coast and is sited within 800
metres from the high water mark. |
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However, the
coastal zone is seen to be in the direct and immediate area
of risk, given that hurricanes and tropical storms make
landfall with all their force in this area and wind force is
likely to be most destructive. The coastal zone is the most
low-lying area in Caribbean Small Island Developing States,
and as a result, prone to coastal flooding due to runoff
from mountains.
Over the decades the impact of tropical storms and
hurricanes has been significant. In Antigua, Hurricane
Georges left six hotels closed; 15% of the 5,800 rooms in
the Dominican Republic were damaged. In St. Kitts, 500-600
rooms were closed for one month. More recently, Hurricane
Ivan in 2004, destroyed. 50% of Grenada’s physical tourism
assets, with a total impact on the sector of an estimated
EC$ 264.3 million. In the period January to April 2005
stay-over visitor arrivals declined by 37% and visitor
expenditure by 41%, over the same period in 2004.
In 2005, Wilma, the strongest Atlantic storm ever recorded,
wrecked Cancun Cozumel and Playa del Carmen ,killed 7 people
and caused $2.6 billion in damages. Waves five to eight
meters (high enough to reach the third floor of many hotels)
slammed against the coastline.
In August of this year, in Quintana Roo’s Costa Maya region,
where Hurricane Dean made landfall as a category 5 storm, a
state of emergency was declared and involved the evacuation
of some 80,000 tourists.
Hurricane Felix slammed into Nicaragua’s Miskito coast as a
Category 5 storm in September, while Hurricane Henriette
made a direct hit on the Cabos resorts of Mexico’s Baja
California peninsula, sending 13 ft (4-meter) waves crashing
onto the shores and killing one tourist walking on the
beach. Amazingly, twin Atlantic and Pacific hurricanes had
made landfall on the same day - an unprecedented occurrence.
Hurricane Dean had struck Mexico further up the Caribbean
coast, then also unprecedented was the fact that two
Category 5 hurricanes had made landfall in the same year.
The impact of Hurricane Noel in November this year on the
Bahamas, made headlines as costing the popular island
destination, millions. Yet, despite information on the
numerous risks associated with building on the edge of the
water, tourism plants continue to be built in the
hazard-prone area of the Caribbean coast.
Good tourism planning has to determine from past experience
what are the optimal approaches to physical planning and to
managing a crisis arising out of the passage of a familiar
natural event such as a hurricane or earthquake, as well as
unfamiliar events such as tsunamis. |
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