By Dana Niland
CJ Contributor

Grand Bahama’s tourism sector is growing.

Tourism stop-over visitors for the year have shown an overall increase of 7.4 percent, according to the Central Bank of the Bahamas latest Monthly Economic and Financial Developments for October 2018.

The report showed improvement after a difficult year for the island in 2017, when arrivals declined by 39.5 percent.

The report noted that despite the ongoing challenges in room capacity after the closure of several hotels due to hurricane damage, stopover visitors to Grand Bahama firmed by 3.5 percent on a year-to-date basis.

Over $3 million has been approved for renovations to the Grand Lucayan, and the process of choosing contractors has already begun; the Bahamas’ government purchased the hotel earlier this year.

The island’s hotel board said it was working on bookings for the next few months, which could lead to at least one additional hotel property being reopened to accommodating the additional bookings.

— CJ