Speaking at his one-on-one session with the media last Friday, the Premier said there are many untapped economic opportunities in cultural tourism and the territory must look at more ways to tie Virgin Islands food, music, dance and other aspects of its culture into the tourism product.

“We have to think about seasonal aspects of our cultural activities as well as our culture overall. For a visitor coming to the Virgin Islands, the experience of visiting at Christmas is different to visiting for Emancipation Festival, and different from visiting for Easter, and different from visiting at any other time,” Fahie said.

“I mention this because sometimes we just do our thing as we are accustomed to doing, and we do not recognise the further potential and further value of what we are doing,” the Minister of Tourism added.

In referring to the upcoming festive season, Fahie said the Virgin Islands has its own special and unique ways of observing the season. He noted it can be seen in the territory’s pastimes, music and food such as the famous tart and guava-berry wine.

The Tourism Minister further said the warmth and the camaraderie of Virgin Islanders and the activities they do to celebrate Christmas is the Virgin Islands culture.

“As I reflect on the richness of our Virgin Islands heritage and our culture – and especially our Christmas time culture as we see aeroplane after aeroplane landing at our airports; as we see the yachts and other maritime guests sailing in; as we see almost daily one and two or even three cruise ships pulling up with visitors to our shores, I cannot help but think about how cultural tourism is enhancing our tourism product – making a more enjoyable experience for our guests and creating economic opportunities for our keen-eyed entrepreneurs,” Fahie said.

“So, while we are making merry, this is something to think about as we are seeing the economy move forward in this positive way as we expose others to what we know best – BVILOVE,” the Tourism Minister added.