That has been the response of residents of Antigua and Barbuda who have
responded to a government’s call for interested persons to make available their
properties to host delegates attending the Fourth Conference of Small Island
Developing States (SIDS)4 here from Mary 27-30.
Project Development Officer in the Minister of Tourism, St. Clair Soleyn has
reported that the response has been tremendous from individuals who have
accepted the call to help provide accommodation for the anticipated 5,000
delegates who will attend the conference.
“It is difficult for me to put a figure as to the number of people who have
responded so far because these calls have been coming in almost constantly. This
is all happening within a matter of days as it was only last Thursday that the
Information Minister, Melfod Nicholas, made the announcement of the
government’s decision to abandoned the cruise ship option to host the delegates,”
Soleyn told Point Express.
The Ministry of Tourism is asking these individuals to make contact and to have
their names registered so that its inspection teams can visit these properties to
conduct inspections.
“We have had to add an extra two teams to do these inspections just to keep up
with the demands. All accommodations must be licensed and inspected in order to
make it to the official list of properties approved by the government,” he explained.
According to Soleyn, the ministry has set of guidelines which all properties for
rental must meet. These are the same that apply to all hotel properties which are
inspected regularly. For the SIDS4 conference the ministry wants to ensure that the
properties meet a standard that is equivalent to what obtains in a 2-Star hotel
property.
Each property must have the following;
security
hot and cold running water
available internet
clean and well-maintained rooms
they must also provide linen and cutlery since these are short-term
accommodations.
a card machine to process credit/debit card payments
The project development officer sad he is confident that Antigua and Barbuda will
meet the challenge and deliver an excellent conference for the thousands of
delegates. “We need 1,000 rooms and so far, it looks like we will meet that target.
We will have a townhall meeting next Wednesday to explain to these persons some
of what we are looking for and what we expect from them,” he stated.
The key areas of concern for Antigua and Barbuda as host of SIDS4 are;
accommodation, health, transportation, technology, security and involvement from
NODS.
Soleyn also disclosed that there are plans to develop a special APP that delegates
will be able to download to access information about Antigua and Barbuda such as
a map to get around and other pertinent information.
