7 News Belize

NCL Replies To FECTAB
posted (December 15, 2016)
Today's encounter with the NCL local boss allowed us to ask him about a few of the complaints coming from the local tour operators who are members of FECTAB.

The biggest issue for them is that almost - if not all - of Norwegian's Cruise ships will divert from the Belize City harbour, to their Harvest Caye island getaway. That means that all the business that those local operators got from tourists coming off NCL's ships has disappeared. The concern is that NCL guests spend the most money - and now all that has gone south. We asked Colin Murphy and Tourism Minister Manuel Heredia Jr. about that and here's what they had to say:

Colin Murphy, Senior VP - NCL
"At the moment we have 80 sum calls scheduled for 2017, we're hoping to grow that as time goes by. We have no contracts with any other cruise lines to come to Harvest Caye at present so it's just our 3 brands. Obviously we've made a significant investment here, we've planted a flag in Belize so it will make a lot of sense for us to support that with more calls."

Daniel Ortiz, 7News
"So in terms of the shift from Belize City to this side, will any of the NCL ships make any calls in Belize City or is it going to be all exclusively to this location?"

Colin Murphy, Senior VP - NCL
"I wouldn't say exclusively but the vast majority of our calls will come to Harvest Caye that's why we've invested so much money and so much time and effort in building this destination, but if there's instances where they can't be accommodated here, of course we can use Belize City. There will be few and far between because the abundance of our trips will be coming to Harvest Caye now."

Daniel Ortiz, 7News
"Are you all engaging other companies to consider coming to Harvest Caye as part of that business model?"

Colin Murphy, Senior VP - NCL
"Other cruise lines, we're not actively marketing ourselves. We understand that's a sensitive issue. At the moment we're just focusing on our own brands, ships and making sure that the guests' experience are as good as they can be."

Reporter
"FECTAB press conference complaining about harvest Caye and Norwegian Cruise Line was that foods were taking out their table, you're taking out Belize City, would you say that's the competitive nature of the business here?"

Colin Murphy, Senior VP - NCL
"Well as I said we've got 400 people working for us down here directly, probably 1200 whose jobs depend on the success of Harvest Caye so really that's a political question. I guess you have to decide whose jobs are more important. FECTAB members or the 1200 people in the south whose jobs are dependent on this development so I can't really directly address FECTAB issues."

Reporter
"Is the fact that you're looking at other options to bring in ships to Belize City enough to allay the concerns that they are running out of business?"

Hon. Manuel Heredia Jr., Minister of Tourism
"Like I said I don't believe that they will run out of business. I believe that if for some reason NCL will say 'okay that's it for us in Belize City', we will immediately invite someone else to come. At one point there were 5 boats that wanted to come at one point and we knew that the village is too small to accommodate to the number of people."

Today, Karen Bevans, the Director of Tourism, told us that in place of NCL, there are two new cruise companies already making calls to Belize. They are Switzerland's MSC Cruise Lines and German Based company, Tui Cruise Line.

Home | Archives | Downloads/Podcasts | Advertise | Contact Us

7 News Belize