The Ministry of Communications and Works - BVI

4 Business View Caribbean Business View Caribbean 5 restaurant, and shopping facilities. Getting tourists to come to BVI is crucial to the eco- nomic lifeblood of the territory. “We suffered a down- turn in our tourism product after 9/11, because persons were not keen on travelling for a little while after,” Vanterpool explains. “That has rebounded quite well. We got a little bit of slowdown after the 2008 recession, but, fortunately, we’ve been growing fairly steadily from a tourism standpoint, especially since 2010-11, and up until now. Our visitors, by the end of 2015, would have surpassed 400,000, compared to in the low 300s a few years back.” The new pier facili- ties helped BVI secure contracts with two of the major cruise companies – Disney and Norwegian – who have guaranteed the territory 425,000 passengers on an annual basis. “Along with other ships, we are already projecting in 2016, about 700,000 passengers for the year,” Vanterpool exclaims. In order to build the new cruise pier, Vanterpool says that $50 million was borrowed from local banks with another six or seven million raised from local inves- tors, both sectors forming another major pillar of the BVI economy. “We have been fortunate to be very at- tractive to banks and financing,” Vanterpool admits. Recently, he adds that the government borrowed an- other $35 million for an expansion of the territory’s electricity generation; it is planning to add another 24 megawatts of power to its current 40MWs. In addition, the Ministry generally budgets about $30 million per Minister endorses campaign Tortola pier park delivers as an unmatched experience Minister Vanterpool meets with Virgin Gorda residents