Joe Issa First to Sound Alarm Bell for Cruise Shipping in Ocho Rios

A Story by Sally Shiv

Joe Issa, tourism guru turned brand builder is the first to admit that the once famous cruise shipping port of Ocho Rios on Jamaica’s north coast is in troubled waters, and evidence has surfaced to pr

Joe Issa, tourism guru turned brand builder is the first to admit that the once famous cruise shipping port of Ocho Rios on Jamaica’s north coast is in troubled waters, and evidence has surfaced to prove him right, with the latest figures showing it has faced the worst summer season in 20 years.

Ahead of the 2015 cruise shipping summer season, which starts in May and ends in October, Joe Issa told a Jamaica Gleaner Forum that the former cruise ship capital of Jamaica was heading for an abyss, on news that the mega liners which once graced its port would be re-directed to the Falmouth Pier.

Commenting in a December 1, 2014 article by Janet Silvera in The Gleaner newspaper titled “Oasis at Ocho Rios Port”, Issa said, “Next summer will be the worst for Ocho Rios in 20 years.”

He recalled the glory days 15 to 20 years ago, when Ocho Rios boasted in excess of 800,000 cruise ship passengers annually, compared to about 400,000 in 2013, which represented approximately 32 per cent of the total annual arrival and a decline of 4.2 per cent relative to 2012.

Issa, who has over 15 years experience in the tourism industry as a senior executive of the island’s largest chain of resort properties, and as many years in the business life of Ocho Rios as a civic leader, predicted that the numbers posted in 2013 would be reduced further, with the pullout of the mega liners from the town in the summer of this year, stressing that the situation needed to be addressed immediately.

Issa would later prove to be right as both the number of cruise ship calls and passengers arriving at the Ocho Rios Port have declined for the May �" October summer months this year.

According to data compiled by the Port Authority of Jamaica accessed on December 10, 2015 at http://www.portjam.com/docs/MonthlyStatisticalReport.pdf,

26 cruise ships called into Ocho Rios Port in May �" October 2015, carrying 93,696 passengers, compared with 32 cruise ship calls in 2014 with 107,304 passengers.

Therefore, with six fewer cruise ship calls and 13,608 less passengers this 2015 summer which ended in October, compared with the same period in 2014, Issa’s prediction has come true as the former cruise ship Mecca saw its worst performance in recent memory.

In addition, although the total number of cruise ship calls into Jamaica increased by seven to 134 in 2015, from 127 in 2014, the number of calls to Ocho Rios Port dropped by six.

Similarly, while the total number of passengers arriving on the island increased by 17,493 to 549,668 in 2015, the number disembarking in Ocho Rios declined by 13,608, clearly indicating that the garden parish of St. Ann no longer harbours the most popular cruise ship port on paradise isle.