Charlestown Nevis (March 9, 2004) -- A three man Nevisian team has recently returned from North America after a successful marketing drive of Nevisian summer festival, Culturama, from a tourism standpoint.
The festival is held to coincide with the Emancipation Week and this year’s edition is significant as the festival will be celebrating its 30th anniversary and has appropriately been dubbed Culturama 30. The actual festival dates are July 22nd to August 3rd, 2004.
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| Mr Antonio Liburd (left) and Mr Tyrone O’Flaherty (right) |
Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Tourism and Culture, Mr Tyrone O’Flaherty, told GIS on Tuesday that during their visit that took them to Toronto and New York cities, the team that also included the Minister, the Hon Mr Malcolm Guishard, and the Executive Director of Culturama, Mr Antonio ‘Abonaty’ Liburd, targeted people of non-Nevisian extraction.
“We know that our people are patriotic and we know they will come home but it would mean so much more from a tourism standpoint,” observed Mr O’Flaherty. “I think that Culturama has the potential to be a real maximum tourism event and if we are able to attract people, who have never heard of Culturama before, to Nevis, I am sure it would be joy to the hearts of the hoteliers and people that own guest houses and so on.”
The promotional tour started off with a meeting, in Toronto, with Nevisians. The team members were later guests at the Africa Direct programme on 105.5 FM, one of the most listened to radio station in Canada, mostly to among West Indians and Nevisians in particular.
He reported that the interview was the high point of their visit because they were able to talk about Nevis and introduce Culturama to persons that really had not heard about the festival before.
“In fact the two DJs that interviewed us knew absolutely nothing about Culturama,” pointed out Mr O’Flaherty.
"The Africa Direct programme is a very popular programme among West Indians and non-Canadians, the immigrant population and so it was really something that meant a lot to us.”
The Permanent Secretary, who is a past Calypso Monarch King, also reported that they are engaged in on-going negotiations with WLIB out of New York with the hope that the radio station would give some programming commitment and also to play local Nevisian music. WLIB has been invited to send representatives to Culturama.
Culturama’s Executive Director, Mr Antonio Liburd, said that the meeting they had in Toronto had a fairly large turnout where “they had a number of questions ranging from innovations for Culturama 30, organisation of shows and activities that would occupy them while they are here during the day.”
The team introduced Nevisian music to the Canadian audience and even non-Nevisians calling into the programme were quite receptive, with many of them requesting information about Culturama. He noted that the festival’s website at www.nevisculturama.net was giving revellers the chance to vote to determine which guest artists they would want to see for Culturama 2004.
“In terms of our new approach to our marketing strategy, which is of going beyond the non-Nevisians and reaching out to other persons of Canadian and American descent, I think that we achieved a great amount in terms of reaching these people,” concluded Mr Liburd.
