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BRIDGETOWN, Barbados -- Caribbean tourism planners and practitioners are being told that the region has little option but to beat the many odds that the industry faces.

Some of the industry’s most creative thinkers and doers will meet in St Kitts next month to formulate winning strategies for the sector. The October 10 to 12 State of the Industry Conference, organized by the region’s tourism development agency, the Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO), has as its theme “Developing a Winning Strategy”.

The CTO’s secretary general, Hugh Riley, says the theme is relevant due to the fact that the Caribbean is the world’s most tourism dependent region.

“We have to win. The Caribbean is the most tourism-depended region in the world. For us, this is not a sideline, this is not a hobby, this is the core of our livelihood and we had better know how to develop strategies that win in the tourism industry which is an extremely competitive business. So we are fighting and we have to win,” Riley said.

The CTO State of the Industry conference brings together about 300 tourism industry leaders from the more than 30 member-countries of the CTO, as well as representatives of the regional and international private sector, academics and members of the media. Billed as three days of provocative discussions and spirited debates about the biggest issues affecting the region’s primary revenue earner, it will be the first official appearance of the new chairman of the CTO’s Council of Ministers and Commissioners who will be elected on 10 October and who will serve for a period of two years.

The conference is organised in collaboration with the St Kitts Ministry of Tourism and the St Kitts Tourism Authority.

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