A snapshot of news statistics from WITT Reports

The WITT Report has been collecting and archiving news reports about Caribbean tourism for nearly five years. Here is a look under the hood, at some ways that local media are delivering local tourism news.

How often does the keyword [ tourism ] appear in WITT archived reports?

The WITT Report calculates that "on any given day an average of between two to nearly three articles out of a hundred articles that appear across all Caribbean news outlets include the keyword [ tourism ] in the title or the first couple of lines in the body of the news item". Average number of news items that include keyword [ tourism ].

The first part of this report includes EMM aggregated news service for all Caribbean media captured in it's system plus all Caribbean news media outlets where the web service has an RSS feed. Data is shown in Table 1.

Data is based on archived reports within this reporting system:

• A: The count of news items with keyword [ tourism ] in all saved WITT reports (1808 reports) from September 4, 2017 to July 31, 2022. (1,791 days)
• B: The count of news items with keyword [ tourism ] in WITT Full Tourism Reports from October 1, 2017 to July 31, 2022. (1608 reports; 1575 reports between December 2, 2017 to August 8, 2022 were used in this calculation.)

There are [ 63163 ] news items that include keyword: [ tourism ] in a total of [ 243602 ] news items in these reports. In other words, 'tourism' appears somewhere in about 25.9% of news items in these archives. The keyword must appear in the title or in the first one or two lines of the body of the news item, just as the news item would appear in the news outlet's RSS feed.

However, looking at the daily averages presents a somewhat different take:

• C: 1,573 THREE DAY Reports from September 4, 2017 to December 22, 2021.
  The average total number of articles in these reports is 1,814 (from all sources) and the average number that include keyword [ tourism ] is 52.8 or 2.9%.
• D: 1,373 THREE DAY Reports from October 1, 2017 to December 22, 2021.
  The average total number of articles in these reports is 974.2 (from all sources) and the average number that include keyword [ tourism ] is 21.8 or 2.1%.
• E: 235 ONE DAY Reports from December 23, 2021 to July 31, 2022.
  The average total number of articles in the reports is 1,148 (from all sources) and the average number that include keyword [ tourism ] is 23.2 or 2.0%.
• F: 235 ONE DAY FULL Tourism Reports from December 23, 2021 to July 31, 2022
  The average total number of articles in the reports is 1137.5 (from all sources) and the average number that include keyword [ tourism ] is 23.3 or 2.1%.

So, the average percentage of news items that include the keyword [ tourism ] on any given day in the EMM reports during this entire period varies between a low of 2.0% to a high of 2.9%. That is, to restate slightly differently: "on any given day, out of a hundred articles that appear across all Caribbean news outlets, an average of between two to nearly three articles include the keyword [ tourism ] in the title or the first couple of lines in the body of the news item".

The WITT Report uses the Europe Media Monitor as a major component of its news gathering. The method for capturing EMM news was changed on December 22, 2021. Around this time, the EMM service changed the description content of the RSS feeds they supplied to include only keywords and not the actual content of the news item. The keywords are selected by the EMM. Due to the change, the total number of items in the EMM feeds is lower resulting in a higher ratio of items with keyword in them but the total number of items with keyword remains about the same.

It is not really possible to draw any firm conclusions from this calculation except to say that the subject of 'tourism' within Caribbean media seems to have a low importance. However, significant numbers of the populations of these countries are either directly or indirectly employed within the tourism sector. This might mean that this audience or clientele is being underserved when it comes to reporting about tourism related news. This audience probably still reads the local news through these news outlets but is aware that there is no to very little content of tourism related news. These readers will need to seek out tourism related news elsewhere. It should be pointed out that for Caribbean readers to be reliant on outside sources for Caribbean news is analagous to the fox guarding the henhouse.

Here is a look at the distribution of news items categorised by the media outlet as they appear in EMM news feeds. Jamaica dominates in this distribution, notably with three outlets in the top ten. The top twenty news outlets deliver just under 70% of all news. Outside the top ten, except for Nation News Barbados, all of these services appear a below average number of times. Report made August 4, 2022.

Table 1: Media outlets in EMM Tourism RSS Reports by # of items that include keyword [ tourism ]
	Name of Media Outlet	Media URL	Count	Find Ratio (See note 1)	Notes
1	Jamaica Observer	jamaicaobserver.com	34,306	6.83%
2	Dominican Today - Dominican Republic	dominicantoday.com	30,078	5.99%
3	Jamaica Gleaner - Latest News	jamaica-gleaner.com	25,653	5.11%
4	St. Maarten Daily Herald	thedailyherald.sx	25,573	5.09%
5	Prensa Latina Cuba - English	plenglish.com	24,141	4.81%
6	The Tribune - Bahamas	tribune242.com	22,729	4.52%
7	The Nassau Guardian	thenassauguardian.com	19,409	3.86%
8	St. Kitts and Nevis Observer	thestkittsnevisobserver.com	18,994	3.78%
9	Trinidad & Tobago Newsday	newsday.co.tt	18,947	3.77%	Top ten
10	Jamaica Government Information Service	jis.gov.jm	18,801	3.74%	47.50%
11	Nation News Barbados	nationnews.com	15,055	3.00%
12	Cayman Compass	caymancompass.com	13,216	2.63%	Average varies between a low of 2.0% to a high of 2.9%
13	The Voice - Saint Lucia	thevoiceslu.com	12,649	2.52%
14	Channel 5 Belize.com	edition.channel5belize.com	12,076	2.40%
15	Caribbean News Global - St Lucia	caribbeannewsglobal.com	11,366	2.26%
16	Virgin Islands Daily News	virginislandsdailynews.com	10,821	2.15%
17	Antigua Observer	antiguaobserver.com	10,532	2.10%
18	NOW-Grenada	nowgrenada.com	9,563	1.90%
19	HTS News 4orce - St Lucia	htsstlucia.org	9,376	1.87%	Top twenty
20	Government of Barbados Information Service	gisbarbados.gov.bb	8,288	1.65%	69.98%
21	Trinidad and Tobago Express	trinidadexpress.com	8,188	1.63%
22	The Anguillian	theanguillian.com	8,028	1.60%
23	DR1 Dominican Republic News & Travel Information Service	dr1.com	7,671	1.53%
24	Caribbean 360	caribbean360.com	7,660	1.53%	Service discontinued
25	ZNS Bahamas	znsbahamas.com	7,543	1.50%
26	The Barbados Advocate	barbadosadvocate.com	6,616	1.32%
27	St. Lucia Star	stluciastar.com	6,262	1.25%
28	Searchlight St. Vincent	searchlight.vc	6,059	1.21%
29	Trinidad Guardian Newspaper	guardian.co.tt	6,059	1.21%
30	CNC3 Television - Trinidad	cnc3.co.tt	5,675	1.13%
31	The San Pedro Sun	sanpedrosun.com	5,482	1.09%
32	ABS TV News	abstvradio.com	5,045	1.00%
33	National Broadcasting Corporation	nbcsvg.com	4,755	0.95%
34	CCN TV6 - Trinidad	tv6tnt.com	4,485	0.89%
35	Jones Bahamas	jonesbahamas.com	3,684	0.73%	Service discontinued
36	Periodico 26 English - Cuba	periodico26.cu	2,531	0.50%
37	Ambergris Today - Belize	ambergristoday.com	2,467	0.49%
38	HPN Haiti.com	hpnhaiti.com	1,792	0.36%
39	The Montserrat Reporter	themontserratreporter.com	1,532	0.31%
40	The Vincentian	thevincentian.com	1,450	0.29%
41	Jamaica Star	jamaica-star.com	1,387	0.28%
42	Loop News Jamaica	jamaica.loopnews.com	1,325	0.26%
43	Cuba Net	cubanet.org/english	1,315	0.26%
44	Caribbean News Agency - Barbados	cananewsonline.com	1,280	0.26%
45	The Grenada Informer	thegrenadainformer.com/news	1,130	0.23%
46	Radio Caribbean International (RCI St. Lucia)	rcistlucia.com	893	0.18%
47	Radio Television Caraibes	rtvc.radiotelevisioncaraibes.com	693	0.14%	Service discontinued
48	Amandala - Belize	amandala.com.bz	668	0.13%
49	Belize Guardian	guardian.bz	517	0.10%
50	Voice of Barbados	vob929.com	452	0.09%
51	The New Today - Grenada	thenewtoday.gd	444	0.09%
52	Belize Reporter	reporter.bz	348	0.07%
53	The Freeport News	thefreeportnews.com	276	0.06%	redirects to thenassauguardian.com
54	Haitian Truth	haitian-truth.org	248	0.05%
55	Spice Islander - Grenada	spiceislander.com	219	0.04%
56	Stabroek News - Guyana	stabroeknews.com	140	0.03%
57	Repeating Islands (Puerto Rico/New York)	repeatingislands.com	120	0.02%	not strictly local
58	Caribbean Broadcasting Corporation - Barbados	cbc.bb	6	0.00%
59	7 News Belize	7newsbelize.com	0	0.00%
60	Go Jamaica	go-jamaica.com	0	0.00%
	Total articles in all EMM reports: 502,394; Total articles with no keyword: 36,376	Total articles in this report	466,018	1.55%	Average

 

Table 2: News reports by day of week	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday	Saturday	Sunday	Weekly
Total number of news items	78,151	69,935	71,077	74,301	69,724	71,775	67,431	502,394
News items that include keyword	76,697	69,336	70,471	73,441	69,156	71,139	66,851	497,091
Find ratio	98.14%	99.14%	99.15%	98.84%	99.19%	99.11%	99.14%	98.96%
Daily find ratio	15.27%	13.92%	14.03%	14.62%	13.77%	14.16%	13.31%	14.15%

 

Table 3: All Media source ratio in archived Full WITT Reports; Sorted by results from highest to lowest. Search was performed on August 12, 2022
	Name of Media Outlet	Media URL	Count	Find Ratio (See note 1)	Notes
1	Jamaica Observer	jamaicaobserver.com	18272	7.50%	in EMM
2	Jamaica Gleaner	jamaica-gleaner.com	14253	5.85%	in EMM
3	Antigua Observer	antiguaobserver.com	14179	5.82%	in EMM
4	The Tribune (Bahamas)	tribune242.com	11434	4.69%	in EMM
5	St. Martin Daily Herald	thedailyherald.sx	10949	4.50%	in EMM
6	Trinidad & Tobago Newsday	newsday.co.tt	9498	3.90%	in EMM
7	The Nassau Guardian	thenassauguardian.com	9096	3.73%	in EMM
8	Dominican Today (Dominican Republic)	dominicantoday.com	6642	2.73%	in EMM
9	The St. Kitts-Nevis Observer	thestkittsnevisobserver.com	6434	2.64%	in EMM
10	Trinidad Express	trinidadexpress.com	4894	2.01%	in EMM
11	Jamaica Government Information Service	jis.gov.jm	4746	1.95%	Official government site; in EMM
12	Caribbean News Global (St Lucia)	caribbeannewsglobal.com	4446	1.83%	in EMM
13	The Voice (St Lucia)	thevoiceslu.com	4430	1.82%	in EMM
14	Virgin Islands Daily News	virginislandsdailynews.com	4277	1.76%	in EMM
15	Barbados Advocate	barbadosadvocate.com	3795	1.56%	in EMM
16	Now Grenada	nowgrenada.com	3499	1.44%	Service discontinued; in EMM
17	Cayman Compass	caymancompass.com	3451	1.42%	in EMM
18	Nation News (Barbados)	nationnews.com	2967	1.22%	in EMM
19	The Anguillian	theanguillian.com	2731	1.12%	in EMM; Good tourism coverage
20	Barbados Government Information Service	gisbarbados.gov.bb	2700	1.11%	Official government site; in EMM
21	St. Lucia Star	stluciastar.com	2447	1.01%	in EMM
22	ZNS Bahamas	znsbahamas.com	2339	0.96%	in EMM
23	Trinidad Guardian Newspaper	guardian.co.tt	2063	0.85%	RSS discontinued; in EMM
24	Searchlight Newspaper (St Vincent)	searchlight.vc	2043	0.84%
25	NBC (St Vincent)	nbcsvg.com	2034	0.84%	in EMM
26	HTS News 4orce (St Lucia)	htsstlucia.org	1759	0.72%	in EMM
27	San Pedro Sun (Belize)	sanpedrosun.com	1728	0.709%
28	Jones Bahamas	jonesbahamas.com	1534	0.63%	Service discontinued; in EMM
29	The Royal Gazette (Bermuda)	royalgazette.com	1310	0.54%
30	Caribbean 360	caribbean360.com	1210	0.50%	Service discontinued; in EMM
31	Jamaica Star	jamaica-star.com	1193	0.49%	in EMM
32	News is My Business (Puerto Rico)	newsismybusiness.com	1054	0.43%
33	Barbados Today	barbadostoday.bb	1030	0.42%	Good Tourism coverage
34	St. Martin News Network	smn-news.com	864	0.36%
35	Times Caribbean Online (St Kitts)	timescaribbeanonline.com	775	0.32%
36	The Grenada Informer	thegrenadainformer.com	751	0.31%	in EMM
37	Caribbean News Service (Antigua)	caribbeannewsservice.com	704	0.29%	Good Tourism coverage
38	Montserrat Reporter	themontserratreporter.com	704	0.29%	in EMM
39	Magnetic Media TV (Turks & Caicos)	magneticmediatv.com	633	0.26%	RSS is weekly
40	The Dominican	thedominican.net	507	0.21%
41	Barbados Underground	barbadosunderground.net	482	0.20%
42	Nevis Pages	nevispages.com	426	0.18%
43	VI Free Press (US Virgin Islands)	vifreepress.com	386	0.16%
44	BES Reporter - News from Bonaire	bes-reporter.com	385	0.16%
45	EyeWitness News - Bahamas Latest News	ewnews.com	385	0.16%
46	St Lucia Times	stluciatimes.com	366	0.15%
47	Aruba Today: Local News	arubatoday.com	348	0.14%
48	Caribbean Broadcasting Corporation (Barbados)	cbc.bb	345	0.14%	in EMM
49	Dominica Vibes	dominicavibes.dm	326	0.13%
50	Spice Islander (Grenada)	spiceislander.com	319	0.13%	in EMM
51	The Barnacle News (Grenada)	thebarnaclenews.com	318	0.13%
52	Dominica News Online	dominicanewsonline.com	298	0.12%
53	Radio Caribbean International (RCI) (St Lucia)	rcistlucia.com	284	0.12%	No regular updates; in EMM
54	Haitian Truth	haitian-truth.org	272	0.11%	in EMM
55	St. Lucia News Online	stlucianewsonline.com	226	0.09%
56	BVI News	bvinews.com	205	0.08%
57	St John Tradewinds News (US Virgin Islands)	stjohntradewinds.com	198	0.08%
58	BVI Beacon	bvibeacon.com	196	0.08%
59	EMO News (Dominica)	emonewsdm.com	195	0.08%
60	CANANEWS - CMC, Barbados	cananewsonline.com	187	0.08%	in EMM
61	The Bahamas Weekly	thebahamasweekly.com	182	0.08%
62	Tobago Today	tobagotoday.co.tt	182	0.08%	Service discontinued; was part of Trinidad Guardian
63	Bahamas Press	bahamaspress.com	159	0.07%	Service discontinued
64	Business Focus St Lucia	businessfocusstlucia.com	155	0.06%	Service discontinued
65	The Bahamas Investor	thebahamasinvestor.com	155	0.06%	Service discontinued
66	VI Consortium (US Virgin Islands)	viconsortium.com	152	0.06%	RSS discontinued
67	Bajan Reporter (Barbados)	bajanreporter.com	149	0.06%
68	Curaçao Chronicle	curacaochronicle.com	134	0.06%
69	The Labour Spokesman	thelabourspokesman.com	123	0.05%	RSS discontinued
70	St Thomas Source	stthomassource.com	115	0.05%
71	Saba News	saba-news.com	109	0.05%
72	Voice of Barbados News Stories	vob929.com	109	0.05%	in EMM
73	RJR Gleaner (Jamaica)	rjrnewsonline.com	80	0.03%
74	Grenada Broadcast	grenadabroadcast.com	72	0.03%	Service discontinued in 2020
75	Repeating Islands (Puerto Rico/New York)	repeatingislands.com	71	0.03%	Not strictly local; in EMM
76	Island Sun | Local News Archives (BVI)	islandsun.com	51	0.02%
77	Cayman News Service	caymannewsservice.com	50	0.02%
78	CTV TnT (Trinidad)	ctvtt.com	41	0.02%	Service discontinued
79	I-Witness News (St Vincent)	iwnsvg.com	28	0.01%
80	Cakafete (Dominica)	sakafete.com	14	0.01%
81	AnguillaTV: Local News Archives	anguillatv.net	9	0.004%	RSS discontinued; no updates since 2021-09-21
82	Cuba Headlines	cubaheadlines.com	9	0.004%	Not followed - no recent updates
83	Montserrat Government	gov.ms	8	0.00%	Official government site
84	Bahamas B2B	bahamasb2b.com	7	0.003%	Service discontinued
85	The New Today	thenewtodaygrenada.com	5	0.00%	RSS is weekly; in EMM as [ thenewtoday.gd ]
86	Caribbean Commerce	carib-commerce.org	4	0.00%	Service discontinued
87	Bernews (Bermuda)	bernews.com	3	0.001%
88	CARICOM	today.caricom.org	1	0%	Official regional government site
89	Broad Street Journal (Barbados)	broadstreetjournalbarbados.com	0	0%	Service discontinued
90	Caribarena (Antigua)	caribarena.com	0	0%	Service discontinued
91	CHTA	caribbeanhotelandtourism.com	0	0%	Not followed - no regular updates
92	CTO	caribbeantravel.com	0	0%	No RSS; Not followed - no regular updates
93	Jamaica Tourism Board	jtbonline.org	0	0%	Official government tourism site
94	Curacao Official Tourism Site	news.curacao.com	0	0%	Official government site
95	SVG Today (St Vincent)	svgtoday.com	0	0%
96	Tobago House of Assembly	tha.gov.tt	0	0%	Official government site
97	The Tobago News	thetobagonews.com	0	0%	Service discontinued
98	Belize Official Tourism Site	travelbelize.org	0	0%	Official tourism site
99	Turks & Caicos Official Tourism Site	turksandcaicostourism.com	0	0%	Official tourism site
100	Aruba Official Tourism Site	visitaruba.com	0	0%	Official tourism site
101	Trinidad Official Tourism Site	visittrinidad.tt	0	0%	Official tourism site
102	US Virgin Islands Official Tourism Site	visitusvi.com	0	0%	Official tourism site
103	WINN-FM (St Kitts)	winnmediaskn.com	0	0%
		Total in this section	177699	72.94%
	News sources in Full WITT Reports found only in news items captured by EMM
	Name of Media Outlet	Media URL	Count	Find Ratio	Notes
1	Channel 5 Belize	channel5belize.com	5501	2.26%
2	Prensa Latina (Cuba)	plenglish.com	3845	1.58%
3	ABS TV News (Antigua)	abstvradio.com	3546	1.46%
4	CNC TV6 (Trinidad)	cnc3.co.tt	3065	1.26%
5	CNC TV6 (Trinidad)	tv6tnt.com	1083	0.45%
6	Perodico 26 (Cuba)	periodico26.cu	801	0.33%
7	Amandala (Belize)	amandala.com.bz	767	0.32%
8	The Vincentian (St Vincent)	thevincentian.com	714	0.29%
9	Stabroek News (Guyana)	stabroeknews.com	684	0.28%
10	Loop News (Jamaica)	jamaica.loopnews.com	663	0.27%
11	The Guardian (Belize)	guardian.bz	559	0.23%
12	Ambergris Cay Today (Belize)	ambergristoday.com	512	0.21%
13	** Haiti Libre	haitilibre.com	128	0.05%
14	HPN Haiti	hpnhaiti.com	116	0.05%
15	Radio Television Caraibes	rtvc.radiotelevisioncaraibes.com	52	0.02%	Service discontinued
16	The Guyana Chronicle	guyanachronicle.com	23	0.01%
17	Television Jamaica	televisionjamaica.com	10	0.00%
18	Kaieteur News Online (Guyana)	kaieteurnewsonline.com	5	0.00%
19	Boston Haitian	bostonhaitian.com	4	0.00%
		Total of news outlets found only in EMM	22078	9.06%
		Total of other language reports	34479	14.154%
		Total of above	234256	96.154%
	** Limited or no English service.

The FULL WITT Reports have been created to narrow the capture of reports with keyword [ tourism ]. The purpose is to refine the results and place a stronger emphasis on finding relevant news. When looking at the FULL WITT Reports (Table 3), the count of news items with keyword [ tourism ] is [ 63163 ] in a total of [ 243602 ] news items in these reports. This represents a Find ratio of [ 25.929% ]. The 'Today's stories' news ticker on the WITT Report main page is also showing a similar listing of relevant news items.

Notes:

This represents the average across all news outlets that are captured in this reporting system. The data collected or reported is based on the mathematical calculation of total number of news items or news items that include keyword [ tourism ] on a daily basis. The use of the keyword [ tourism ] has been the most effective keyword within this reporting method. Other keywords did not deliver any useful results. Some articles may appear in services that have been discontinued.

Up until December 22, 2021, reports include news items with keyword [ tourism ] within the previous THREE DAYS, after this date, the capture was for the previous ONE DAY.

However:

- The change from three day to one day reporting does not appear to impact the overall results.
- There is no way to calculate for the media outlets that were introduced or were discontinued during this period.
- There are gaps in the reporting periods: from 2018-01-28 to 2018-03-04; from 2019-01-23 to 2019-03-03; from 2020-01-29 to 2020-03-04 and occasionally whenever the EMM server might have been down.

Search Results for [ country name ] in archived EMM RSS Feeds

It is also useful to see how often countries are mentioned in these archives. The second part of this report includes ONLY EMM aggregated news reports for all Caribbean news outlets captured in it's system.

EMM search was performed on August 01, 2022 and Full Report search was performed on August 12, 2022

Rank	Table 4: Ranking of news items in EMM Reports; by Country Name + Variations (Top ten in bold type)	News items w/ keyword in EMM Reports	Find ratio (See note 1)	News items w/ keyword in Full WITT Reports Aug 12, 2022	Find ratio (See note 1)	WorldBank 2018 International Air Arrival Data (MM)
1	Jamaica or J'ca*	53926	10.74%	21487	15.00%	2.473
2	Bahamas	32197	6.41%	10480	7.32%	1.6332
3	Barbados	26656	5.31%	8402	5.87%	0.680
4	Saint Lucia*	23639	4.71%	7513	5.25%	0.395
5	Tobago	22111	4.40%	7667	5.35%	< 0.02
6	Cuba	20346	4.05%	14323	10.00%	4.684
7	Dominican Republic	19942	3.97%	4816	3.36%	6.569
8	Antigua	13258	2.64%	9051	6.32%	0.2693
9	Trinidad / T'dad*	13003	2.59%	5375	3.75%	0.3754
10	Grenada	11957	2.38%	3946	2.76%	0.185
11	Cayman (Cayman Brac, Cayman Islands, Grand Cayman, Little Cayman)	11799	2.35%	2988	2.09%	-
12	- Barbuda	11632	2.32%	7052	4.92%	-
13	Anguilla	8411	1.68%	2707	1.89%	-
14	Saint Kitts*	7813	1.56%	2990	2.09%	0.1255
15	- Nevis	7300	1.45%	3109	2.17%	-
16	Aruba	7121	1.42%	1312	0.92%	1.082
17	Cayman Islands (See # 11)	6586	1.31%	1419	0.99%	0.463
18	Sint Maarten*	6535	1.30%	3572	2.49%	0.1786
19	Saint Vincent*	6532	1.30%	2522	1.76%	0.0807
20	- Grenadines	6336	1.261	2131	1.49%	-
21	- Nassau	6271	1.25%	2133	1.49%	-
22	Virgin Islands	4283	0.85%	1939	1.35%	-
23	British Virgin Islands / BVI*	3403	0.68%	1283	0.90%	0.192
24	Puerto Rico	3324	0.66%	2621	1.83%	3.068
25	Haiti	2569	0.51%	1048	0.73%	0.447
26	CARICOM	2542	0.51%	2253	1.57%	-
27	Saint Eustatius* / Statia	2417	0.48%	942	0.66%	-
28	OECS	2305	0.46%	835	0.58%	-
29	Saint Martin*	2256	0.05%	728	0.58%	-
30	US Virgin Islands / USVI / US VI*	2115	0.42%	887	0.62%	0.381
31	Montserrat	1680	0.33%	1054	0.74%	-
32	Bermuda	1360	0.27%	1231	0.86%	0.282
33	Martinique	1120	0.22%	351	0.25%	-
34	Saba	1119	0.22%	578	0.40%	-
35	Dominica	882	0.18%	1174	0.82%	0.063
36	Turks and Caicos Islands*	871	0.17%	174	0.12%	0.441
37	Bonaire	527	0.11%	547	0.38%	-
38	Dutch Caribbean	361	0.07%	291	0.20%	-
39	Guadeloupe	333	0.07%	157	0.11%	-
40	Curacao	267	0.05%	95	0.07%	0.432
41	French Caribbean	228	0.05%	43	0.03%	-
42	Saint Barthelemy*	59	0.01%	1	0.00%	-
	Saint Barthélemy*	Not found
Total articles in this report		357,392		143227

The number of mentions is not directly related to the popularity of the destination but rather may offer a clue as to how well destination managers are getting the word out to local Caribbean news media regarding their destination. This data may reflect the importance of the destination in how local destination managers as well as local news media report on tourism related news. Some articles may appear without mentioning the country name.

Jamaica has the most reports with 53,926 out of a total of 502,269 articles archived during this period, or 10.74% of all articles. Also, the number of days shows that Jamaica was mentioned in 1797 reports. This means that Jamaica was present in the news often, probably a daily basis. This is more than the total number of reports (1729), so most likely Jamaica or it's variant [ J'ca ] are mentioned more than once in the same news report. Jamaica also has the most English language media outlets.

Jamaica does not receive the highest number of international arrivals and yet is ranked at # 1 in mentions in news items in these reports. This may be due to the newsworthiness of Jamaica as a destination such as when news items mention 'Sandals/Beaches' or 'Negril' or 'Ocho Rios', as examples. It may also be related to how well Jamaica news services talk about their tourism as well as to how well they distribute their news. The importance of this cannot be overstated. Because Jamaica has a high visibility in tourism news reporting means that local people as well as visitors are more likely to benefit, and be better informed, from this heightened presence.

This number is more than 67% higher than the next one which is Bahamas and double to triple, or more, than any other number in the top ten. This demonstrates that Jamaica is highly motivated to keep its presence in local media at a high level and has been successful in doing so for an extended period, nearly five years as shown here but certainly longer than this. It is a target worth shooting for by most Caribbean destinations.

While Jamaica exceeds the average by four to five times, all of the top ten destinations exceed the average for results within this reporting method. Except for Barbuda, the other countries shown do not appear with a frequency above the average. Barbuda may be an anomaly with it normally being stated as 'Antigua and Barbuda'. Most tourism to this country is to Antigua, hence the way the name has been shown here.

In another case, according to 'Caribbean & Co.', Dominican Republic, Cuba, along with Jamaica are top of the list of the 10 Most Visited Caribbean Islands. However, 'Tobago' is mentioned more often than the Dominican Republic or Cuba in these news reports. So, this emphasises that the frequency of mentions is not related to the popularity of the destination. In fact, despite 'Tobago' being mentioned more than these other places, it only garners a small fraction of the visitor arrivals that these other places get.

WorldBank international air arrival data for 2018 shows the most popular Caribbean destinations in that year were Dominican Republic (6.569MM arrivals) (# 7), Cuba (4.684MM arrivals) (# 6) and Jamaica (2.473MM arrivals) (# 1). So, while the Dominican Republic had the highest arrival numbers it only ranks at position # 7 in the frequency of news items. This data does not include arrivals by cruise ship.

As we explore the numbers further, out of the top ten countries in the ranking above: The Bahamas had 1.633MM arrivals (# 2), Barbados had .68MM (# 3), Saint Lucia had .395MM (# 4), Antigua had .269MM (# 8). Trinidad and Tobago combined had .375MM arrivals (# 9) with arrival data for Tobago from the Central Statistical Office showing less than 20,000 arrivals for 2018. And lastly, Grenada had .185MM arrivals (# 10).

Clearly, name mentions in local media do not correspond to arrival data and do not appear to be a factor in influencing arrival numbers. There are other forces at play such as availability of flights and room stock as well as advertising in source markets. Populations size, as mentioned, is also an important factor. So, whereas a large island such as Puerto Rico can expect to receive a high number of international arrivals, just based on relative size of its diaspora, a smaller country such as Barbados does not have such a large diaspora or expat community to draw on.

Outside the top ten grouping, the number of mentions is below the average to even hardly being mentioned at all. Destinations in the lower part of the lower group do not substantially benefit from exposure in local media. The result may also be related to fewer news outlets being available from these destinations. More mentions of these destinations in relating tourism stories with positive outcomes is almost certain to bring heightened awareness.

Another anomaly pertains to language. The other islands such as Guadeloupe and Martinique where English is not the primary language have a lower ranking in the frequency of related news. All of these islands are very popular but because the archived EMM reports mainly include English speaking news services, the occurrence of the predominantly French destinations is not accurately reflected. These countries might benefit by offering more English news services.

Take the much higher arrivals performance of Cuba and the Dominican Republic, which are primarily Spanish speaking countries. It is possible that the distribution of news from these countries in English has an impact in increasing awareness in English speaking markets. Both of these destinations receive more visitors than Jamaica so there are also other factors contributing to the higher arrival numbers.

Conversely, Puerto Rico had 3.068MM arrivals, the third highest, yet manages only position # 24 in the ranking of new items. The number of arrivals is most likely related to the population of the country (3.0MM in 2018, worldometer.info) and suggests most arrivals are returning diaspora / visiting friends and relatives. Puerto Rico does not distribute much tourism news in English which may be the main factor in dropping it's position to # 24.

Aruba had 1.082MM arrivals vs Antigus with .269MM, nearly four time higher, yet was in position # 16 vs # 8 for Antigua. Again, the language in Aruba is not English but rather is Papiamento, so availability of tourism news in English will be less.

Of all the people employed in the Travel & Tourism sector, most likely the largest group will be people employed in service jobs in hotels, restaurants, bed & breakfast and so on. These people may not be interested in tourism news, per se. There is, however, a very important group that cannot be filtered out of the employment data too easily. This group would be the taxi drivers and tour guides. Another group may be those who are employed at a community level providing art and craft or other souvenir items. These people may be more interested in finding out about current affairs as relates to their own businesses. They may also find news about competitors interesting so as to learn more about best practices or successful ventures.

Clearly, there can be an enormous benefit to promoting these people and heightening the awareness of the services they provide. In particular visitors may be interested to hear about these people. Press releases and news items by local reporters supplied to local media would help in increasing information available. This may be happening sporadically but more can be done.

Also, as the Caribbean Tourism Organisation states in its byline: 'One Sea, One Voice, One Caribbean', there is an opportunity to align with more over-arching goals of bringing Caribbean peoples together as well as to co-promote. Broadcasting this message with more force may help to elevate the value of Caribbean tourism news, in general.