+Undoctored Media release from The Commonwealth Friday 2 July 2021, 09:56 AM 1 minute to Read The dramatic plunge in global tourism due to the COVID-19 pandemic is having far-reaching and devastating effects, particularly for Small States. Yesterday, during a Commonwealth Tourism Seminar, the Commonwealth Secretariat proposed the development of a global ‘Tourism Action Plan’ to help spur a much-needed recovery. Tourism is the economic lifeblood for many Commonwealth Small States, in particular Small Island Developing States (SIDS) where almost 90% of tourism comes from international tourists. Speaking at the event, the Hon Allen Chastanet Prime Minister of St Lucia explained the local impact: “This crisis has given us the perfect economic lab to examine the impact of tourism because we have lost it for 18 months. In St Lucia, we’ve had a 20% contraction in our economy, 90% of that was because of the inaccessibility of tourism. Our debt stock increased by 10% and our economy contracted by 20%. We now know given the fallout that the economic impact of tourism in our own destinations is very far-reaching and creates opportunities that maybe were not taken advantage of in better days.”