2026 News

Jamaica to Host 2nd CTO Air Connectivity Summit Next February

ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA (May 15, 2026) — Jamaica will host the second annual Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) Air Connectivity Summit in Kingston on Feb. 23, 2027, building on the success of this year’s inaugural event in Bermuda and aiming to advance regional air travel amid ongoing global challenges.

Tourism Minister Edmund Bartlett made the announcement while speaking at the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association’s (CHTA) Caribbean Travel Marketplace in Antigua on Thursday.

“The summit will provide strategic insight for regional planning,” Minister Bartlett said. “Jamaica will use that as a means not only of bringing airline partners together, but also to engage in some cerebration … some thinking around the future of air connectivity in our region, which is so important.”

The Jamaican tourism leader noted the timing will coincide with heightened focus on resilience, coming just one week after the United Nations-designated Global Tourism Resilience Day on Feb. 17 — an initiative Jamaica championed.

The summit follows the first CTO Air Connectivity Summit held Feb. 24, 2026, in Hamilton, Bermuda. That event drew ministers and directors of tourism, airline executives, airport leaders and industry stakeholders to address capacity gaps, high taxes and fees, and the need for stronger intra-regional and long-haul services.

In her summit wrap-up remarks, Rosa Harris, chair of the CTO Airlift Committee and director of tourism for the Cayman Islands, described air connectivity as “our oxygen” and “an economic lifeline” for the region.

“If we can’t get off the island, we can’t develop business, we can’t feed our people,” Harris said. She highlighted two major milestones achieved: delivery of the CTO Airlift Study by ASM and the successful hosting of the inaugural summit.

Harris emphasized data-driven route development, noting the study showed steady traffic growth alongside capacity gaps in Europe and key South American markets — specifically Italy, Argentina, Chile and Brazil — with strong potential for new direct services.

Destinations were encouraged to build credible business cases for airlines, de-risk new routes through collaborative marketing, optimize existing infrastructure before expanding, and reduce reliance on high taxes and airport fees that hinder intra-Caribbean travel.

“Competition is our fragmentation — we must expand our collective marketing power,” Harris quoted Sint Maarten Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Tourism Grisha Heyliger-Marten. Calls were made for a shift from competition to collaboration, stronger alignment among ministries of finance, immigration and tourism, interline agreements, and ensuring adequate and diverse accommodations while carefully managing seat capacity.

The Bermuda summit also produced a memorandum of understanding between CTO and Airports Council International – Latin America and the Caribbean to strengthen aviation-tourism collaboration.

Dona Regis-Prosper, CTO secretary-general and CEO, said sustained momentum is critical. “Hosting the 2027 summit in Jamaica will allow us to translate the insights from Bermuda into concrete actions — forging new partnerships, addressing persistent challenges in airlift and strengthening the One Caribbean vision for resilient, connected growth,” she said.

She will be heading to Jamaica soon to meet with Director of Tourism Donovan White to advance plans for the event which will focus on building credible business cases for airlines, optimizing infrastructure, expanding interline agreements and diversifying source markets.

It comes as the region grapples with geopolitical headwinds while celebrating gains from South America, which saw a 23.7% rise in arrivals to the Caribbean in 2025, reaching 2.4 million visits.

Separately, Saint Lucia will host the inaugural CTO Latin American Market Summit on May 5-6, 2027, with a strong focus on improving air connectivity to that fast-growing market.