A long-term decline in the cruise ship industry in Cayman means that action will have to be taken before the sector “declines to nothing”, Tourism and Ports Minister Kenneth Bryan warned at a press briefing Wednesday.
He said the loss of the cruise-income stream would put at risk 2,587 jobs – close to 6% of total employment.
But Bryan said it would be up to the people to decide whether Cayman pushes ahead with a cruise terminal capable of handling huge ships.
He added that a three-pronged “historic” referendum, to be held in tandem with the general election, which will also include questions on the decriminalisation of cannabis for personal use and a national lottery, would guide policy and the future of Cayman for decades.
He said that statistics had shown that “It’s no exaggeration to say the topics … will shape our beloved Cayman Islands for generations to come.”
Bryan added, “It’s fair to say that each of these questions define a different pathway for us in the future.”
He said that the cruise industry was moving to bigger ships and that the country would have to react to that or lose out altogether because the new wave of vessels was “largely bypassing Cayman”.
Bryan added, “Without intervention, this decline is expected to continue until our cruise line industry as we know it declines to nothing.”
“Without a cruise pier, the Cayman Islands is essentially deciding to step away from the cruise industry,” he said.
“Consequently, we believe building a pier is in the best interests of the Cayman Islands … however, this is not a decision we intend to take ourselves.”
A recent Economics and Statistics Office report, The Economic Impact of Cruise Tourism in the Cayman Islands, highlighted at the briefing, pointed to the recent drop in cruise passengers, which was largely attributed to the lack of a cruise pier.
“By not having a cruise port, Cayman lost between 17,621 and 419,026 visitors in 2024,” the report said.
“This is expected to worsen as cruise lines increase the number of larger-class vessels in their fleet.”
Industry in decline
Bryan added that the cruise industry had been in decline, which had become even more noticeable since the COVID-19 pandemic.
He highlighted that further contraction would affect Caymanian workers, businesses and the economy as a whole because of the loss of “millions of dollars the cruise industry contributes on an annual basis”.
He accepted that some people feared the country would be overwhelmed by the huge number of passengers mega-ships could carry – but insisted that could be managed to keep the industry sustainable.
“It’s better to have the opportunity to limit numbers than not to have the opportunity to have any at all,” Bryan said.
He added that “whatever that figure may be”, it could be fixed so it was what the country wanted and could accommodate comfortably.
“I don’t think the public would want mass tourism, but a pier allows us to control it,” he said
Bryan explained that holding all four votes together would save on costs and disruption to schools and businesses, and would allow more time for “consultation and debate” as well as educational programmes.
‘Accept the will of the people’
He added it would also give eligible people who were not registered to vote until 1 Jan. 2025 to get themselves on the electoral register.
Bryan said most of the Opposition would be in favour of the referendum and that “some issues should not have a political spin”.
He added, “We will accept the will of the people on the cruise terminal and take guidance on the other two questions.”
Bryan said he would be attending a Florida-Caribbean Cruise Association conference in St. Maarten later this month and that he had invited representatives from the anti-terminal group Cruise Port Referendum Cayman (CPR) and the pro-pier Association for the Advancement of Cruise Tourism (ACT) to go with him.
He added that ACT had said it would attend, but CPR had declined because of the short timeframe.
Bryan said, “It’s important that both groups have the opportunity to fully understand what the future of the cruise industry is looking like, particularly over the next 10 years.”
He added that the government would launch a major public education campaign on the referendum subjects, including a national debate on TV, a video covering the three questions, a special website and extensive use of social media channels to spread information as widely as possible.
Although the government favoured the cruise pier plan, the education campaign would be even-handed and include both sides of the argument, he said, adding, “The government has been very diligent in trying to ensure we are promoting this in a balanced way, promoting pros and cons.
“The government has not said it would not promote the negatives … I don’t think it can be presented as being unfair.”
But he said, as it was a government referendum, the administration “had the right” to put its own case to the public.
Government statistician Ralston Henry earlier said at the briefing that cruise ship expenditure in Cayman peaked at $178.1 million in 2018, but stood at $132.8 million last year and is expected to fall to $128.9 million this year.
Shopping and excursions accounted for more than 86% of cruise passenger spending, followed by food and drink and other recreational activities.
Most cruise passenger spending benefited the wholesale and retail industries, with Caymanians accounting for 46% of people employed in the two sectors.
Cruise arrivals are expected to fall by 4.8% this year, but increase by 5.2% in 2025.
But arrivals are projected to decline by an average of 5.2% a year from then.
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My wife and I are frequent visitors to all three beautiful Cayman Islands. As a stay over vacationer, I find cruise ships in George Town reduce our pleasure.
We have to look and see how many ships are in before we decide to visit Georgetown. The crowds are unbearable today and I can only imagine what they would be like with the mega ships.
I also see the creation of a pier an ongoing development. What are the plans for the capacity of future generation of ships? Will this mean further dredging and additional extensions of the harbour?
In terms of damage to the harbour how many businesses and jobs would be lost? I can see Eden Rock Divers potentially going out of business with the lost of the Devil Groto reef. The last plans I saw also showed Don Fosters and Sunset House home reefs were in danger from sediment of dredging the harbour.
With regards to “ He said the loss of the cruise-income stream would put at risk 2,587 jobs – close to 6% of total employment.” I would challenge an examination of these numbers as to them being exclusively associated with cruise only customers. Would not some of these also be serving stay over customer?
Cayman receives more income per stay over customer than with cruise visitors. There is also the question of money spent onboard ship if the cruise customers can get the product cheaper. That’s right a cruise ship represents an opportunity but each ship is also a large competitor for tourist dollars with each visit.
There is also evidence of cruise ships investing in Cayman businesses. Likely they would steer their excursions to these companies then reap the added benefit of their share of the profits.
As you can gather I’m against any new pier and if built, and the crowds become too much, we make look at other islands to visit.
The Minister seems to be infatuated with the cruiseship industry, whilst our far more valuable airline arrivals are increasing at a rapid rate. I suggest he turns his attention to our rapidly disappearing West Bay Beach, without which our stay over visitors will start declining at the same rate as the cruise ship visits. Also where does Mr Henry get his information from, on cruise passenger spending – is he conducting exit interviews?.
Wow, what a bunch of government propaganda hype! So a 5.2% drop in cruise ship numbers is being touted a “a loss of cruise ship visitors altogether!” Be careful what you read and what the government is pushing for. Who is really going to to benefit from this pier being built? It’s not the meager 46% of Caymanians in the wholesale and retail cruise sector. It’s CERTAINLY not the environment. It’s not all of us who would be dealing with a huge increase in traffic on the already insanely overcrowded roads. It’s those in government getting kick backs from the cruise lines. And yes, it’s government receiving an increase in passenger fees. Let’s corner the market on smaller cruise ships because even though the cruise lines are manufacturing larger ships, don’t be fooled into believing that the smaller ships are going to disappear! There are a lot of people who still want the smaller ship experience, and these are the people who will actually be willing to spend more money in our retail store, restaurants and on excursions.
Scare tactics. Remember what it was like during Covid lockdown. Do you really need all those gift shops? Maybe something higher quality than the made in China plastic trinkets and t shirts.
Grand Cayman, and particularly George Town, is simply not large enough to sustain mega ship passengers. We too, find out how many cruise ships are expected daily, just to avoid going to George Town altogether on days when there is more than one ship. I could not fathom what the island would look like with passengers coming off a mega ship.. I’ve witnessed enough disappointing behavior from cruise passengers, who really don’t seem to have anything invested in the actual island experience.. it’s just another Caribbean island with a beach, food, and trinkets.