InterCaribbean Airways inaugurated a non-stop service between Barbados and Jamaica, with Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade Kerrie Symmonds framing the event early Wednesday afternoon as a “missing link” for direct travel between the two countries.Joined by Barbados Tourism Marketing Inc. (BTMI) officials in welcoming the flight from Kingston just before 2 p.m. on Wednesday, the minister declared that easy access to intra-regional travel must remain a high-priority target for all Caribbean countries.He recalled an October 2023 conference on regional connectivity by the Association of Caribbean States (ACS) that demonstrated the region’s transit challenges.“The region had a connectivity conference in Martinique,” said Symmonds. “It was really a platform where thinkers of these issues that we have discussed today very casually – how we connect for the purposes of tourism and recreational travel, how we connect for the purposes of our economic development and our commerce in this region, both by way of air and, of course, sea, and how we treat to these issues.“Quite frankly, the Caribbean has had a challenge of connectivity. InterCaribbean has come into this southern Caribbean region, and helped us solve some major problems that we have been confronted with.”Symmonds emphasised that the Martinique forum left officials with a strong desire to collaborate not only in the region but also internationally, to make connectivity a reality.
