Well-respected and influential President of the Caribbean Hotel Association (CHA), Barbadian tourism investor, Peter Odle, has taken the pleasure of visiting Anguilla which he knows very well and to meet with the membership of the Anguilla Hotel and Tourism Association (AHTA).

Mr. Peter Odle

“The CHA is a gathering of all the Hotel Associations of the region which is our constituency so it is important for me to represent their interests, hear their concerns and articulate them. And the only way to that is to come and meet the people themselves and this is what I have done,” Mr. Odle told The Anguillian.

Mr. Odle was elected to his two-year post in 2006 at the CTO Conference in Miami. “One of the main things I wanted to do was to bring back the Small Hotels Retreat which was held at the in September at the Hilton in Barbados,” he stated. “It was a resounding success. We had a 188 representatives from 18 countries in attendance and we are going to have it again the same time next year.

Ms. Trudy Nixon

“We are also in the process of restructuring CHA. For many years we had three offices and it is not sufficient. We have upgraded the whole technical base of CHA. We are putting together an investment fund and we hope to launch that by April next year. If we can achieve that, it will also be another major step. The fund is designed for small, medium and independent hotels. It is not only to help hoteliers but also the ancillary sector including the ground tour operators, car rental people and so on. The fund has been developed to help the smaller hoteliers who traditionally had difficulty in assessing finance from various lending institutions.”

Asked about some of the specific matters he discussed with the Hotel and Tourism Association, Mr. Odle explained: “Well basically, I told them some of the challenges that the region is facing. We talked at length about the fact that there has been a lot of quick development taking place in Anguilla; and, as I said, one of the concerns is whether the infrastructure can cope with the amount of development that is taking place. Let me make it clear. We are not against development. We are for development but we want to see a sustained and orderly development.”

In addition to being the President of CHA, Mr. Odle is Chairman of the Barbados Tourist Board and was President of the Barbados Hotel Association. He is the Chairman of 22 different companies in Barbados. He owns four hotels, grouped under ‘Mango Bay Resorts’. The biggest has 76 rooms and the other four have over 30 rooms each. “We deal with 100 different tour operators world-wide including many in the Caribbean. He is the Chairman of Caribbean Aircraft and is involved in real estate, restaurants, publishing, farming, gaming and other companies.

Mr. Odle was questioned about his expansion plans in the Caribbean. “I am just about to launch something fairly major but I am not at liberty to do it yet because we are just finishing the legal work,” he responded. “Once that is finished, trust me – you are going to hear from me.

“We are going to be looking to Anguilla to see if we can do some investment on the island. Not only here as we will be looking around the whole Caribbean. But I love Anguilla. I have been coming here for over 20 years. I came here before Cap Juluca was built, in the days when the Mariners was the big hotel; so I am a steadfast believer in Anguilla. I think it is a fabulous country. I think you have some of the most incredible beaches in the world. The people are lovely and I think that one thing you must not do is spoil it by over-development.”

Executive Director of the Anguilla Hotel and Tourism Association, Trudy Nixon, had these comments: “We are delighted to have Peter Odle as President of the Caribbean Hotel Association both in his professional capacity and from a personal point of view because he is an hotelier and a lover of the Caribbean tourism product. He is a professional tourist – he goes out and stays in the best hotels in the world and he thinks that Anguilla has one of the top products in the world.”

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