88 January 2016 - Business View Caribbean
Blue Mall St. Maarten
A shopping oasis on a small caribbean island
St. Maarten is an island nation in the Lesser Antilles
region of the Caribbean. It is a constituent country of
the Kingdom of the Netherlands, sharing Saint Martin
Island with its counterpart to the north, the Collectivité
de Saint-Martin, an overseas “collectivity” and former
colony of France. Dutch St. Maarten, which comprises
about 40 percent of the island, has a population of ap-
proximately 34,000 in an area of 13 square miles. Its
economy is mostly based on tourism – long-term visi-
tors and day tourists from the many cruise lines that
dock in Phillipsburg Harbor in the nation’s capital.
On a narrow strip of territory on St. Maarten’s west-
ern shore, between Simpson Lagoon to the north and
