Crash course in West Indies on how to cash in on World Cup cricket

Kingston, May 20 (UNI) As preparations for next year's World Cup goes in full swing, organisers in the West Indies arranged a crash course for the islanders on how to cash in on the cricketing extravaganza.

A large number of residents in Kingston and St Andrew attended the course earlier this week at the Jamaica Conference Centre where they were told how to make the best use of the showpiece event.

Jamaica has been named host of the opening ceremony, four warm up matches, seven first-round games and a semi-final.

Robert Bryan, executive director of Jamaica Cricket 2007, told the gathering, ''The opportunity is to organise ourselves to take advantage of all of the commercial activities, whether in food, in entertainment, in tourism products, in points of interest that the city of Kingston will be able to offer during the period.'' ''Far more important, I believe, is to actually get people thinking as to how using the (World Cup) we can actually begin to reposition Kingston in the long term,'' he was quoted as saying by the Jamaica Observer.

Region one director of the Social Development Commission (SDC), Courtney Brown, said communities in Trench Town, Rae Town, Allman Town, downtown and as far as Port Royal could also benefit from the event.

He told Sporting World, ''The main thing, as a social development agency, is the issue of legacy ... what is it that the cricket can cause to happen towards promoting a more long-term development for Jamaica.'' ''We have identified a couple of communities that might have a unique product ... Trench Town, for example, has Bob Marley. There's just one Bob Marley in the world, how can they leverage this event? Some 20,000 to 30,000 visitors are expected ... 2.5 billion are expected to be watching, numerous journalists come from abroad ...

how can Trench Town, how can maybe a Rae Town Oldies leverage this event? How can a Passa Passa leverage this event towards making themselves better known, as well as positioning Kingston and these activities ... as possibilities beyond the world cup? ''The bed and breakfast programme is another side to it, so therefore we (SDC) act as an anchor to pull the TPDCo (Tourism Product Development Company) and the JBDC (Jamaica Business Development Centre) to come and speak with the communities so they can come and see the possibilities and therefore use the cricket as a means of supporting a wider social development platform,'' he added.

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