Jamaica’s Minister of Tourism, Hon. Edmund Bartlett, has offered Saudi Arabia a “people-first” blueprint for achieving its ambitious target of creating One Million Careersthrough tourism under Vision 2030.
Speaking on the panel “Delivering Saudi Vision Beyond 2030” at World Travel Market (WTM) Saudi Arabia on Thursday, Minister Bartlett said the success of Saudi Arabia’s mega tourism investments will ultimately depend on the people delivering the visitor experience. “The strongest destinations are not built on concrete alone. They are built on careers. On people. On dignity.”
Describing the One Million Careers target as “a covenant with a generation,” Minister Bartlett positioned Jamaica, as a mature tourism destination, as a partner in helping Saudi Arabia build a sustainable tourism workforce.
He pointed to Jamaica’s experience in developing human capital through institutions and programmes including the HEART/NSTA Trust, Jamaica Centre of Tourism Innovation and the Global Tourism Resilience & Crisis Management Centre (GTRCMC). “Guests do not remember the marble in the lobby,” he said. “They remember the young Saudi who welcomed them with pride and professionalism.”
Minister Bartlett urged Saudi Arabia to ensure that tourism jobs become long-term careers, with clear pathways from entry-level positions to management and entrepreneurship, supported by training, scholarships and opportunities for ownership.
“If you want One Million Careers to last beyond 2030, young Saudis must see a forty-year future in this sector — with training, with promotion, with ownership,” he said. “That is how you build a national workforce. Not just fill positions.”
He also highlighted Jamaica’s experience in protecting tourism workers through the world’s first Tourism Workers’ Pension Scheme, as well as crisis-time support and retraining following COVID-19 and other disruptions. “A destination is only as resilient as its people,” Minister Bartlett said. “Worker protection is not a cost. It is the insurance policy for your One Million Careers.”
The Minister proposed formal Jamaica–Saudi collaboration, including partnerships between the GTRCMC and Saudi training academies and an exchange programme focused on workforce development and tourism resilience. “Our model is simple, and it scales: develop the workforce, professionalize the skills, create the career ladder, protect the worker,” he said.
Minister Bartlett predicted that Saudi Arabia’s greatest tourism achievement in the decade ahead may not be its mega-projects, but the workforce behind them. “Ten years from now, the world will not just talk about Saudi’s mega-projects. They will talk about Saudi’s One Million Careers — the most skilled, most protected, most professional tourism workforce on the planet.”
