By GIS Dominica
ROSEAU, Dominica – The rollout of the Commonwealth of Dominica e-passport is progressing smoothly, says police inspector in charge of immigration Deryck St Rose; meanwhile, director of tourism and chief executive officer of Discover Dominica Authority Colin Piper, says the ‘Safe in Nature’ and ‘Work in Nature’ campaigns have been very successful in keeping Dominica’s tourism brand in the spotlight during the COVID-19 pandemic, reports GIS Dominica.
E-Passport
Inspector St Rose, who has been overseeing the process since it began in February, says he is pleased with the public’s response to the availability of two mobile units facilitating passport registration in selected communities, outlined some of the requirements for citizens wishing to register to transition from the machine-readable to the e-passport.
“We need two passport-sized photos; a birth certificate; in the case of a married woman she will need to present a marriage certificate; you must have a recommender to recommend the form stating that they know you for a period of years; and in the case of a child, an infant, you would have to know the parent for a number of years. Also, the recommender has to certify at the back of one of the photographs,” inspector St Rose stated.
St Rose explained that there are a few options for those making payments for their e-passport.
“All payments are made at the treasury but now we are on the road with the mobile kits. We have our officer there who the people in the rural communities can pay, and get a receipt and that receipt will be attached to their application for processing. Also, people can go online, on the government website to pay for the passport there, print it out and attach it to the form,” inspector St Rose added.
Meanwhile, the director of tourism and chief executive officer of Discover Dominica Authority Piper says through the “Safe in Nature” campaign hoteliers were able to open up through certification are begin to see some semblance of revenue generation.
“Safe in Nature’ has almost become a brand of itself as with one nice easy phrase ‘Safe in Nature’ people understand the messaging. So the certainty, the assurity that you can have a good time in Dominica was brought across very clearly with ‘Safe in Nature.’ And so, we were able to indicate to potential travellers that if they came to Dominica they could have a good time, they could go out, they could experience things and that has gone over well,” Piper added. The “Work in Nature” campaign on the other hand, is picking up steam.
“Recently we have been voted by Kayak as one of the leading remote work programmes in the Caribbean and so we intend to build from that. We have had quite a bit of interest and we continue to go through the applications so that we can ensure that we can dot the i’s and cross the t’s because we are inviting people to essentially be a ‘longer stay’ visitor and almost become a resident as part of the “Work In Nature” programme and so it something that is working out well for us,” the chief executive officer explained. The “Safe in Nature” and “Work in Nature” campaigns will continue beyond the COVID-19 pandemic.
“As a result of the pandemic, health, safety and security, these sort of things have become more critical, more important to travellers. And so the product that Dominica is offering, the natural aspect of things augers well for them. So we are taking advantage of that. But definitely, I believe “Work in Nature” and “Safe in Nature” will continue beyond the pandemic,” Piper added. “It is something we will continue to use as we talk about the destination.”
