As Caribbean tourism heads continue to lobby the British government over impending increases in a UK airline ticket tax on long haul flights, Jamaica says it could lose between £30 million ($49 million) and £50 million ($82 million) when the proposed hikes take effect in November.

The revised Air Passenger Duty (APD) places long haul destinations like Jamaica and the rest of the Caribbean in one of the highest bands, with economy class passengers facing a tax of £50 ($82) per ticket as of November 2009, and the amount increasing to £75 ($123) in 2010. The proposed tax for premium economy, business, and first class tickets, will be double that amount.

Jamaica’s Tourism Minister Edmund Bartlett was among ministers and members of the Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) who met with industry partners in London and also lobbied members of the British Parliament for a review of the classification criteria.
He said when the increase is implemented it will have a deleterious effect on UK visitor arrivals in the Caribbean. Bartlett said that it will not only affect the affordability of families visiting friends and relatives, but also have an enormous economic impact.

“The Caribbean is, indeed, the most tourism dependent region in the world,” the Jamaican leader said, adding that “1.4 million visitors from the UK come to the Caribbean on an annual basis and, on some of our islands, the tourism traffic is heavily skewed towards the UK”.

The bands are based on the distance from London to the capital of the destination country, rather than on the destination itself. This means that flying to Los Angeles or Hawaii is effectively calculated as being the same as to Washington DC (Band B), while destinations in the Caribbean are charged at a higher rate of tax (in Band C).

Environmentalists have welcomed the tax hike, which takes effect in November, but the travel industry has criticized it because it will make tickets more expensive. But Minister Bartlett maintained that the increased tax is inherently unfair “and not the least bit green”.