ST JAMES, Jamaica – Jamaica’s groundbreaking Tourism Workers Pension Scheme could become a model for other Caribbean countries, following interest shown by some regional leaders in adopting the initiative.

Minister of Tourism Edmund Bartlett said that regional heads attending the 41st Caribbean Travel Marketplace, held recently in Barbados, were “very receptive” to the idea, especially since it has already been successfully implemented in Jamaica.

“An important consideration is that it has tremendous implications for capital formation across the Caribbean because there are one million workers in the tourism sector in the region, 643,000 of which are working directly in the industry and the others indirectly,” he pointed out.

“And, if that pension plan is taken across the region as Jamaica has it, there is the potential to create a level of domestic savings the size of which the region would never have seen. Imagine the thought of providing a pool of low-cost funds to build the Caribbean,” he noted further.