Philipsburg: --- Commissioner of Finance and Tourism Roy Marlin at yesterday's press briefing gave an update on his recent trip to Brazil where he signed a principal letter of intent with Tarcisio Gargioni, V.P. Marketing and Services for VRG Linhas Aereas S.A in Brazil since the latter would begin charter flights to St. Maarten.The commissioner said the flight would leave San Paulo to Caracas Venezuela before departing to St. Maarten.
The commissioner said he has already made contact with the Minister of Air Transportation Maurice Adriens and the department of Civil Aviations since the airline would need the necessary permits from civil aviation prior to landing here. Marlin said he is very pleased with the quick response that was given since Civil Aviation already indicated to the company what is needed for the granting of the permits.
He said that he is aiming to have these flights twice weekly on Thursdays and Sundays tentatively starting at the end of November. The airline is looking at the minimum seats which have to be 60 passengers for destination to St. Maarten.
The Commissioner said the island is looking at having more that the minimum amount of passengers since they have been in the South American market for quite sometime. He said that the island is well known in these islands. He said there are two other charters that normally operate within the region. The commissioner of tourism said that he is looking into tapping into these other markets to see if he can offset the effects of the US and European economic crisis which is not affecting the South American region. He said that Brazilians has a good disposable income which is good for coming to the island. Another disadvantage for the additional flight is intended to cut down the amount of flight time to reach the island.
The commissioner is calling on both government and private sectors to put their heads together to make this attempt work. He said already the airline is stopping in Venezuela for fuel refill and while there are no direct airlines that bring passengers from that country to St. Maarten his intention is to work on that with the Minister of transportation who would then assist in contacting the Venezuelan authorities to make this a possibility.
"While my focus would be on the Brazilian market at this moment it is only natural to sit with the Venezuelan authorities since there is no flights leaving there to St. Maarten and the fact that this airline is already stopping there would only make things easier." Marlin explained.
The commissioner also spoke of the new route that Jet Blue as February 14, 2009 from Boston to St. Maarten. This he said is an opportunity for the island to look at its marketing strategies.
The island government he said already allocated $200,000 for marketing the island for the high season. He said more monies should be made by November depending on the availability of funds. He said he took note of the amount of monies Aruba allocated to marketing the island abroad. Marlin said he is continuously monitoring the financial crisis in the US. He said the island would expect a down turn this season which is being monitored.
Marlin reminded that St. Maarten have been through these types of crisis before and has managed to overcome. He said that after the aftermath of hurricane Luis in 1995, hurricane Lenny in 1999 are only some of the hardships the island was able to recover from.
He cautioned the businesses not to start screaming ‘wolf' prior to seeing one because doing so too early will negatively affect the situation. "Yes we have to put our heads our heads together to mitigate the effects of the US financial crisis but we need to be realistic in doing so.