The Weekender spoke to seasoned maritime professional Lorraine Talmi to discuss updates within the industry. With two businesses and 15 years’ experience in the marine industry, Talmi has a strong reading of the pulse of the sector. She is also President of the Executive Board of the St. Maarten Hospitality & Trade Association, and President of Kidz at Sea Foundation.
How would you say it's going with the marine industry, especially considering recovery since Irma?
I think the Marine Sector, like Cruise, is on a faster pace to recovery than stayover, but the effects of the hurricane are still restricting it. There is still a great deal of debris in the lagoon, hazards to navigation and instead of beautiful vistas, we have lots of derelict vessels and wrecks scattered around most noticeably for all visitors, immediately after they arrive at the airport.
Are things almost back to normal? No. The sector has lost some berthing capacity and in general enough has not been done to let our visitors know that the island is able to accommodate them.
The economy is at approximately 40% of where it was before Irma. While some companies in the sector are doing really well, a lot of that is on segments that were not normally as strong before Irma, like Marine Construction and Salvage; marine survey and vessel repairs.
The airport is still a major obstacle to the island’s overall recovery and in some categories, our pricing is not correct, like fuel, for example, which can be as much as $0.10 per litter more expensive than some of neighbouring competitors, which is a direct impact of the fuel excise fee charged by the Harbour in support of the Causeway loan and multiplier effect of TOT [turnover tax].
How about your own business?
I have two businesses. Our accounting business suffered small setbacks in the immediate aftermath of Irma, but has luckily not been too impacted as most of our clients are trying to adapt to the new normal and keep it together; through this business, we work with a number of members of the marine industry as well as many in our restaurant sector and as such have a strong reading of the pulse of both these sectors.
Our marine electronics business experienced an abbreviated season last year, but so far this season, which is just starting, is showing signs of promise of returning.
Are there any current highlights or setbacks worth addressing?
In terms of highlights, the start of season is upon us and reservations and advance communications prior to port calls look very promising for a begin to return to some level of consistency. We’ve also garnered generous support for the Kidz At Sea Program, Zero to Hero. The first group graduated last month with the first level commercial Captain’s licensing; and the 2nd course started this week. This initiative is a direct result of Hurricane Irma and has 100% privately sponsored support to help unemployed young persons find not only gainful short-term employment but careers as internationally certified marine professionals. The industry is very excited about this feeder pool of St. Maarteners into our labour force.
Setbacks, as I mentioned, are still the restrictions caused due to the damage at the airport, the lack of clear and executable policy and priority funding allocation regarding the clean-up of wrecks and now derelict vessels and the slowness of the government to tackle the remaining debris removal in the water and on the land side.
All citizens need to be more cognizant of how much the environment plays a role in our Tourism Product and do all that they can to protect it, which includes not littering on beaches or throwing garbage on the road. Directly or indirectly, we all survive off the beauty of our island.
Prior to Irma, we also experienced major issues with Immigration policy enforcement unique to St. Maarten that had a negative impact on crew members of both yachts and cruise ships.
Despite discussions with the various Justice Ministers involved over the last few years, no real resolution has come to pass; now that the industry is coming back with more visitors, the uncertainty about whether the visa enforcement issues for crew will return gives many of us concern for the length of the season and the continued rebuilding of our reputation.
***Editor’s note: Tourism Minister Stuart Johnson has a statement in this edition of The Weekender pertaining to this issue. This announcement has not been made before, so marine industry professionals have not been made aware of any changes. See related story: The Minister’s statement on page 1 of this special edition.
What do you think the coming year will look like for the industry?
It’s hard to say, Yachting is a highly mobile industry, so while advance reservations look good, at least through the end of January, we won’t know what our clients think or how long they will stay until they come and experience St. Maarten as it is today. The industry overall has a positive attitude.
The SMMTA has been doing its utmost to get the word out about the state of our industry and our capacity to perform; and we are also excited about what the Heineken Regatta Foundation is doing for the anniversary of the Regatta and the new Multihull Regatta being launched; but nevertheless, a lot remains to be seen about how the overall industry will perform over the season.
I've noticed more cooperation within the tourism industry in general; do you see the effects of that, as a decision-maker for your business? Or from your role within the SHTA?
In terms of cooperation between public sector and private sector, that can be attributed directly to the appointment of May-Ling Chun as interim Director of St. Maarten Tourist Bureau, and the role of Regina Labega in the TEATT [Tourism, Economic Affairs, Transport and Telecommunications] Minister’s Cabinet, despite any controversy.
These two professionals have a deep knowledge of our tourism product and the cooperation it takes to make it work: No one party can do it alone. Their connections are broad, not just with our local stakeholders but with the international players as well. They both know the value of picking up the phone to get the story straight or to bring the necessary parties together.
There is a lot still to be done and we are by no means running full steam; but the more parties communicate, the more we are likely to be on the same page and moving in the same direction toward the benefit of our main economic driver.
The bottom line is that we must work together, in a determined focused manner, monitoring ROI [return on investment] on all of our actions or we are all sunk. Monitoring ROI on all actions includes cross ministry policies that may or may not have the overall desired effect toward economic recovery, such as the application of Fiscal holidays, the timely issuance of building permits, immigration policy, or the urgent handling of the dump and the airport.
