Min­utes, af­ter Fi­nance Min­is­ter Colm Im­bert pre­sent­ed the 2025 Bud­get, Min­is­ter of Tourism and Cul­ture Ran­dall Mitchell, ex­pressed op­ti­mism about the Gov­ern­ment's fo­cus on the tourism and cul­tur­al sec­tors. 

“I’m pleased to be able to con­tin­ue work­ing to­wards im­prov­ing the gains in the tourism and cul­tur­al sec­tors to en­sure an in­creased pro­duc­tion and con­tri­bu­tion to GDP,” Mitchell stat­ed, high­light­ing the piv­otal role these sec­tors play in the na­tion's eco­nom­ic land­scape.

Im­bert said Trinidad and To­ba­go’s tourism in­dus­try is ex­pe­ri­enc­ing a re­mark­able resur­gence, with air­lines tak­ing the lead in this post-pan­dem­ic re­vival. 

He said there has been a 36 per cent surge in air ar­rivals in 2023, with pro­jec­tions for 2024 to ex­ceed these num­bers.

“We are wit­ness­ing a tourism resur­gence,” he de­clared, em­pha­siz­ing the im­por­tance of in­creased air­lift from ma­jor car­ri­ers.

Both Caribbean Air­lines and Fron­tier Air­lines have ramped up op­er­a­tions, in­tro­duc­ing new routes from Puer­to Ri­co and the British Vir­gin Is­lands, while strate­gic part­ner­ships with British Air­ways and KLM are ex­pand­ing the na­tion’s glob­al con­nec­tiv­i­ty.

“These ef­forts are es­sen­tial to en­hanc­ing our ac­cess to North and South Amer­i­can mar­kets,” Im­bert not­ed, men­tion­ing on­go­ing plans to ac­quire ad­di­tion­al air­craft.

Set­ting an am­bi­tious tar­get of 500,000 an­nu­al vis­i­tors by 2026, Im­bert at­trib­uted this goal to strate­gic mar­ket­ing and sig­nif­i­cant in­fra­struc­ture in­vest­ments, in­clud­ing a $56.6 mil­lion ren­o­va­tion of the Mag­dale­na Grand and a $400 mil­lion mod­erni­sa­tion of the Hilton Trinidad.

"These up­grades are key to stay­ing com­pet­i­tive and cre­at­ing jobs," he as­sert­ed, pro­ject­ing hun­dreds of new po­si­tions in hos­pi­tal­i­ty as a di­rect re­sult of these ini­tia­tives.

In ad­di­tion to ex­pand­ing air ser­vices through new agree­ments with the UAE, Qatar, and the Nether­lands, Im­bert re­in­forced the idea that these de­vel­op­ments so­lid­i­fy Trinidad and To­ba­go’s sta­tus as a pre­mier tourism des­ti­na­tion. “Open­ing these mar­kets is cru­cial for our growth,” he added.

Cul­tur­al tourism is al­so gain­ing mo­men­tum, with the Na­tion­al Mu­si­cal In­stru­ment Bill recog­nis­ing the steel­pan and a $120 mil­lion in­vest­ment planned for Pan Trin­ba­go’s new head­quar­ters.

“The steel­pan is a sym­bol of our na­tion­al pride, and it holds vast glob­al ap­peal,” Im­bert re­marked, point­ing to the po­ten­tial for cul­tur­al events to at­tract in­ter­na­tion­al vis­i­tors.

He said Car­ni­val 2024 proved to be a high­light, gen­er­at­ing US $93 mil­lion (TT $632 mil­lion) and at­tract­ing over 41,000 in­ter­na­tion­al vis­i­tors.

“Car­ni­val is not just a cul­tur­al event; it’s an eco­nom­ic pow­er­house, sup­port­ing over 15,000 jobs this year alone,” he stat­ed.

Im­bert pro­ject­ed sig­nif­i­cant job cre­ation in the tourism sec­tor in the com­ing years. He high­light­ed the up­com­ing Mar­riott-brand­ed ho­tel in To­ba­go, which will gen­er­ate 750 jobs dur­ing con­struc­tion and 220 per­ma­nent po­si­tions there­after.

“Tourism is not just vi­tal for our eco­nom­ic di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion—it’s a long-term en­gine for growth and pros­per­i­ty,” Im­bert con­clud­ed.