 Welcome to Nation Beat. I am Janelle Norville bringing you this brief on the pearls of our nation and highlights around the heart of St. Lucia. St. Lucia is on target to exceed 1 million tourists this year as the tourism sector continues to soar. The Department of Infrastructure has signed the Consultancy Agreement for Designs for the Millennium Highway and West Coast Roads Project and set in the pace for milestone celebration. On the heels of being crowned the world's leading honeymoon destination, as well as trending destination for millennials in 2019, St. Lucia is on target to exceed 1 million tourists this year. Last year, the island experienced a more than 10% overall increase in visitor arrivals. The figures were released at a press conference hosted by the Minister for Tourism, Culture, Creative Industries, Information and Broadcasting. In the year 2018, the island recorded the arrival of some 1.2 million tourists to its shores. A 10.2% overall increase was recorded. The cruise sector saw an increase of 13.6%, the yachting sector recorded an increase of 26.7% and stay-over arrivals increased by 2.2%. Minister for Tourism, Information and Broadcasting, Culture and Creative Industries Dominic Fady indicated that the industry continues to surpass expectations. For guest staying in hotels, we missed a 400,000 mark by just about 5,000 people. Cruise stay-over arrival numbers came in at 394,780 visitors to our shores, or it represents a 2.2% increase. Overall, the destination grew by some 10.2%. So these are very, very strong numbers. The UK market is very encouraging, came in with a very strong December. And this is despite all the uncertainty in the world about Brexit, we see that the UK in December recorded an 18% increase. But what this says is that despite all of the challenges and despite all of the obstacles that St Lucia's demand in the UK is still very, very strong. And this is something that we continue to build on. The minister expressed gratitude to all entities that devoted their time and effort to ensure that St Lucia remained the premier destination. A project will also be coming on stream to ensure that the full impact of the industry can be measured. According to Minister Fede, there currently exists no clear cut way to measure tourist expenditure. A figure that he said was estimated to be close to one billion dollars. However, the ministry is soon to rectify the issue. One of the projects that we're working on to make sure that we properly record the economic impact of tourism is to make sure that we institute what is called a tourism satellite account. So that we'll be able to trace the tourism dollars step by step. But while we are doing that, we're also working on an exciting project to enhance the revenue performance of the destination in all visitor areas, in point surfing, among our taxi drivers, with our vendors. And the area where we began is with our vendors. Over 200 of them have been trained in our OECS Tourism Competitive Project. And what we're basically training them in is our areas such as customer service, areas such as product development, you would see as you go through the market, there is some level of repetitiveness and copying on the part of some of the vendors. The government of St Lucia is currently embarking on several projects with the aim of ensuring that St Lucia's are able to benefit from St Lucia's growing tourism industry. Meantime moves are afoot to increase the room stock on Ireland, more in this report. St Lucia continues to be among the leading destinations in the Caribbean as the government presses ahead to facilitate an enabling environment for growth within the sector. The extension of the point surfing booth one last year enabled mega vessels such as Caribbean Anthem of the Seas with a 5,000 passenger capacity to dock in the castries harbor. The Prime Minister of St Lucia, Hon. Alan Sharsney during his New Year's address stated that bigger ships with the capacity for 6,000 passengers are coming into the sector and adjustments must be made in order to receive them. It was this same sort of vision by the United Workers Party Administration which resulted in point surfing complex being built in the 80s. This is now proving inadequate and we have to reinvest in point surfing and expand our investment to also improve the products, services and recreation opportunities in the castries market area. The Prime Minister stated that the hotel plant in the north of the island is on the verge of expansion as accommodation is a vital and fundamental part of tourism supply. Hon. Alan Sharsney explained that the Rex properties at Rodney Bay is in development and the Rex St Lucia is to undergo reconstruction. Sandals at shock is being upgraded and the construction of a Hyatt Hotel in St Lucia is in progress. Hyatt is a major international brand and we're now fortunate to have it showing an interest in this country once again. Invest in Lucia has completed transactions with a Barbados based firm to buy land at shock for an 800 room Hyatt Hotel which should be a mixture of the European plant and all-inclusive. Construction is due to begin in the second half of 2019. The government also plans to improve the safety and capacity of the national road network. A recent audit determined at present approximately 52% of our road network is classified as good or fair with the remaining 48% being classified as poor or very poor. Hence, when we've already begun the road improvement and maintenance program to address the quality of the road network in St Lucia through strategic maintenance of primary roads and 55 kilometers of secondary roads. The government will make an investment of $500 million into road rehabilitation. From the government information service, I am Anisia Antoine reporting. As you heard in that Anisia Antoine report, the government has emacked some $500 million for road rehabilitation in the country. An investment that will enhance the visitor experience here. On Wednesday, January 23, the Department of Infrastructure will officially sign the consultancy agreement contract for the designs and will launch the Millennium Highway and West Coast Roads Upgrading project. This signals immediate commencement of the project. The project will deliver complete rehabilitation of the Millennium Highway, reconstruction of the West Coast Roads from Colisec all the way to Souffre, design for construction of the new Anselre Bridge and a robust island-wide road safety program. All this work will be done with grant funding from the Caribbean Development Bank, United Kingdom Caribbean Infrastructure Partnership Fund. This will result in an injection of approximately $115 million into the local economy. And as the tourism rate, source and development projects get on stream, key stakeholders are being engaged as well as positioned to benefit from the gains of the sector. The Office of the Mayor has officially launched the vendors registration program. It was preceded by several consultations held in 2017 with merchants from the vendors arcade, provisions and craft markets and roadside traders. The vendors registration program will provide significant benefits to vendors such as free access to public comfort stations, job letters identifying them as authorized vendors, ID cards and tent packages for roadside vendors amongst other benefits. So far, 178 vendors have been registered under the program. This is Nation Beat, coming up setting the pace for our milestone celebration, the initials 40th anniversary of independence. Black Cegatoka is a fungal disease which affects the leaves of banana and plantain plants. It causes a reduction in the size of the bunch and the quality of the fruit. In commercial banana and plantain production, Black Cegatoka disease is controlled with chemical as well as non-chemical measures. Chemical measures involve the application of spray oil and fungicides. However, it is neither practical nor safe to use agrochemicals to control Black Cegatoka in backyard gardens. Non-chemical measures include good agronomic and cultural practices such as weed control and proper drainage. Affected parts of leaves should be pruned or cut off from the plant. Use a clean, sharp cutlass or knife. Infected leaves should be disposed of properly or added to a compost heap. For more information on how to treat and control Black Cegatoka on your farm or in your backyard garden, contact the Black Cegatoka Management Unit at 451-5091-451-5894 or email bpmu at candw.lc. This message is brought to you by the Ministry of Agriculture in collaboration with the International Cooperation and Development Fund of the Republic of China on Taiwan. Welcome back. It's our time. That's the rallying call from the nation's leader as plans get underway for the celebration of St. Lucia's 40th anniversary of independence. During this year's New Year's address to the nation, Prime Minister the Hon. Alan Shastney noted that the occasion is a time for reflection but also a time for all St. Lucians to celebrate in grand style our achievements as a nation. Prime Minister Shastney urged nationals to abandon defensive behaviors and unite. Doing so, he underscored would better position the island. Let us rededicate ourselves to the task of pushing our country forward. Let us remember St. Lucia is a nation built on values that are worth protecting. We cannot be our own enemies when the real enemies are poverty, deprivation, underdevelopment and critically lost opportunities. The policies of the government are to provide affordable, quality healthcare, globally competitive education, public safety and security for all. Our policies are designed to create opportunities for our people through employment and participation in economic activity. I urge you to join us in making these things happen. Meantime, a year-long calendar of events has been planned for the milestone celebration. We get details from Anissa Antoine. Activities for Independence 40 were launched here on December 12, 2018. Since then, the planning committee has been busy fine-tuning the program for the year-long observance which will culminate on December 12, 2019. Last week, committee members including Sonia Sifle apprised the media of some of the events planned. We have the St. Lucia story and we call it Pity Zil Gwewew. It means we're a small island of a big dream. And this is going to be a production put on by Mr. Adrian Oje. We also will have the best of St. Lucia. And when we talk about the best of St. Lucia, we really want to promote excellence. We are talking about no mediocrity. So therefore, we want that night to get our best singers in all genres, folk, calypso, soca, jazz, everything on that night. So we will be really having a treat. The theme for this year's Independence celebration is all in our journey, our future. And Minister with responsibility for culture and creative industries, Senator Fortuna Bell Rose encouraged St. Lucia to heed this call. Our country is moving into deliverance mode. And we all must be in as a theme of this Independence celebration. We must all be in. But we must be in with the right attitude. We must be in with the right mindset. We must understand the value of respect and our fellow men, of our fellow men. We must believe in love and the golden rule of doing unto others as we will have them do unto us. The minister also stressed the significance of the number 40. So today, we are here on the eve of our nation's 40th birthday. You know, at 40, one is expected to be very mature and know exactly what they were about and where they headed. And our fellow men of the West is very clear on that direction. Last week's event also saw presentations by the Youth Group representative, the Miss Independence pageant as well as organizers of the religious program for Independence 40. The press event also featured the premiere of a special Independence song written by Ronald Boo Hinkson as well as a performance by Rashad who is featured in the Independence 40 music video. From the Government Information Service, I am Anisia Antoine reporting. That's nation beat. Join us next time on NTN at 7.30pm with a repeat at 7.30am and on this station as we fill the pulse and heart of our community. You can also catch up with us anytime on the St Lucia Government Facebook page or YouTube channel. I am General Norville.