Nautical Tourism In The Leeward Islands

International yachting, nautical charter, and luxury yachting are essential segments of nautical tourism, which each year generate close to 3.5 billion CFA francs in direct economic spin-offs.
Their potential for growth and the structuring of the destination make it a competitive advantage over the whole of the insular South Pacific navigation area. Much of the activity is now concentrated on the Raromatai archipelago, which plans to take advantage of it to continue its tourist development.
Since 2010, the “Nautical Tourism in the Leeward Islands” program has been developed and built jointly by all the Tavanas of the seven municipalities of the archipelago, the Administrative Subdivision, the professionals and the CCISM.
Two “meetings” were organized in December 2010 and February 2012 with the Ministry of Tourism, the services of the Country and the State, to arrive at a concrete plan of action, organized around four components: federating the actors , Infrastructure and services, training, and communication. All the planned actions were carried out and, after five years, the first assessments were carried out in order to measure the progress and the difficulties that have arisen.
Tourism Minister Nicole Bouteau, following a first meeting with the Administrative Sub-Division and CCISM last June, wanted to gather with them all of Tavana and their representatives from Bora Bora, Maupiti, Taha’a, Taputapuatea , Tumaraa and Uturoa, as well as the Director of the Hava’i Community of Local Authorities, following the Mayors’ meeting on Friday at the Presidency. Everyone was able to present both the expectations and the ambitions of the communes and their populations.
In this context, mention was made of recurring problems in terms of conflicts over the use and sharing of maritime spaces, as well as the preservation of remarkable nautical sites, such as the Tahaa coral garden or the breeding site Rays manta in Maupiti. Issues concerning the quality, cost-effectiveness, management and maintenance of the yachting infrastructure were also raised, as municipalities were faced with a great deal of deterioration and difficulty in operating these sites. Finally, a new effort on decentralized training and access to the nautical tourism activities for the youth of the archipelago is also perceived as necessary in the coming years.
There is no shortage of new infrastructure projects in all municipalities, but they must be accompanied by appropriate management tools. To this end, it was agreed to hold technical meetings on the various blocking points with the mayors and professionals during the coming months until the “3rd meetings of the nautical tourism in the Leeward Islands” scheduled For Friday, December 1, 2017.
 
(Source: Tahiti News Tourisme 08 August 2017)