Big bucks for Carnival
Celebrity interest, holistic vacation opportunities have Government eyeing record earnings next year
Published:Monday | April 8, 2024 | 12:09 AMAinsworth Morris/Staff Reporter
For Jade La Croix, resident of the United States, flying to Jamaica for Carnival in 2024 “was more than a priority”.
Like La Croix and thousands of other tourists, Jamaica was the place to be “post -Spring Break”.
“It was a priority among my friends, and I came to Jamaica for the first time. We saved for this! We planned for this, and the experience is spectacular!” La Croix, who was jumping with Xodus band, told The Gleaner yesterday during the this year’s Carnival Road March.
Numerous celebrities, such as popular Twitch and YouTuber streamers Kai Cenat, Adin Ross, and several of their friends also flew into Jamaica for the first time to experience Jamaica Carnival.
The 22-year-old Cenat, an American of Trinidadian and Haitian parentage, may not be Jamaican but grew up among immigrants from the Caribbean island in New York.
Combined with his popularity – through his nine million followers on Twitch – Cenat’s affinity for Jamaica and all things Jamaican has created waves of social media attraction to the island for Carnival this year.
According to the Ministry of Tourism, Carnival in Jamaica has been described as one of the fastest-growing events of its kind in the Caribbean region with 2019 – the pre-pandemic year – seen as the most successful.
‘Can’t get flights into Kingston’
In a recent interview with Television Jamaica, Delano Seiveright, senior strategist in the Ministry of Tourism, said around $4.6 billion was raked into the island from Carnival in 2019 and the Government expects to earn some $5 billion from Carnival in 2025.
“Of course, COVID came in 2020 and messed us up for at least two years, two and a half years. We’re now back up and running, I believe, at 100 per cent. Based on the projections now, we’re expecting over 9,000 revellers and at least 50,000 participants,” Seiveright said.
“We have a significant number of folks who will be flying into Jamaica from the United States, United Kingdom, and, of course, the Caribbean, so much so that a lot of people are complaining that they can’t get flights into Kingston,” he said.
Although Trinidad is recognised as the mother of all Carnivals in the Caribbean, Dominic Bell, communications manager, Campari Carnival – one of the major partners for Carnival in Jamaica for 2024, which came together with two of the major bands, Xodus and YardMas – yesterday told The Gleaner on Campari Boulevard that Carnival in Jamaica plays a critical role in showcasing to tourists the cultural aspects of the island.
“The tourist numbers are almost back to where they were in 2019, and these tourist numbers mark a lot of our key target markets when it comes on to tourism in Jamaica. Think of the East Coast in the US, where around this time, it’s not as cold as the winter season, but there are still some chills, so the persons want to come down and enjoy themselves. And [think] of the wider diaspora networks in London, Toronto, Canada,” Bell said.
“We have the only Carnival in Jamaica which allows for the participation of reggae, [and] dancehall – Jamaican genres – and also allows for the participation of tourist attractions. By having a carnival in Kingston but within a one-hour driving distance from Ocho Rios tourist attractions and even further to Trelawny, it provides a holistic vacation package, and that’s why our industry grows annually. You have persons going for fish at Hellshire or the downtown Kingston Creative Art Walk,” he said.
He also said the new Campari Carnival brand is about creating and maintaining linkages and creating employment in the different industries.
“Yes, Campari is a spirits company partnering with the leading bands in Jamaica, Xodus, and Yard Mas. You have over 1,000 Jamaicans who benefit from temporary employment during the Carnival season, but then with the wider linkages and that of the orange economy of the creative and cultural spaces, it attracts tourists,” Bell said.
With Carnival bands selling packages costing in excess of US$1,000, it takes millions of US dollars from the organisers to get Carnival in Jamaica going.
Dania Beckford, director of YardMas, said her band had invested millions in Carnival to not just benefit tourists who travel to Jamaica for the experience, but more so the people in Jamaica.
“It’s a huge investment, because a lot of persons, when they think about Carnival, they will say, ‘The costume is so expensive’. You’re not just paying for a costume, you’re paying for a whole experience. It’s the trucks on the road. It’s the food on the road all day. It’s the build out of the space. It’s how many jobs we provide for people, so it’s well over US$100 million. That’s why no one business can do it by themself,” Beckford said.
Pierre Goubault, chief executive officer of Xodus, said with new and growing infrastructure now in place in Kingston, development of housing with Airbnbs and much wider roads, the country is now able to facilitate more tourists, especially for the Carnival experience.
“We have much better flights and more flights coming from more [different] regions, a lot of rooms stock with more hotels are being built in and around Kingston and Airbnbs, so we do have the potential to grow,” he said.