A positive picture
Tourism executives from Mauritius, the Seychelles, Réunion and the Comoros meet to evaluate the success of the Vanilla Islands regional organisation showing a positive picture for the islands.
Tourism executives from Mauritius, the Seychelles, Réunion and the Comoros met on Wednesday 13 January in Port Louis to evaluate the success of the Vanilla Islands regional organisation, where their first ministerial meeting was held in 2016. Chaired by Xavier-Luc Duval, the Deputy Prime Minister of Mauritius, the ministers and tourism leaders of the islands of the Indian Ocean met to assess the audit of the Vanilla Islands’ accounts, presented by Pascal Viroleau, the CEO of the organisation, assisted by Karine Jasmin from EXA, the company which carried out the audit. Having approved the presented accounts, Xavier-Luc Deval, the deputy Prime Minister of Mauritius, Alain St. Ange, Minister for Tourism and Culture for the Seychelles, Didier Robert, President of the Regional Board of Réunion and Hissane Guy, the President of Tourism for the Comoros, discussed the action plan for 2016 presented by Pascal Viroleau, the CEO of the Vanilla Islands. Representatives from the tourism offices of the various islands in the region were also invited to present their point of view, along with visitor arrival statistics from the various tourism markets in the region. This meeting was also the occasion for Robert Desvaux, the President of Tourism for Mauritius, to update delegates about the hotel classification programme undertaken by the island in 2016.
It was agreed at the ministerial meeting of the Vanilla Islands to continue making progress to make the Indian Ocean the ultimate cruise destination. The decision was also taken to continue discussions on creating a low-cost airline to ensure better air connectivity for the region. Further discussions will take place at a future meeting, during which a study, already underway, will be presented and analysed.
