A constraint that can become a value
The Caribbean is experiencing climate change directly, brutally and continuously. More intense cyclonic seasons, accelerated coastal erosion, fragile coral ecosystems, energy vulnerability: no island in the region has been totally spared. For a long time, this reality has been presented as a constraint for public budgets, for tourism operators and for economic models based on the classic spa industry.
The Travel Dreams 2026 report by Amadeus, however, suggests a possible turnaround. What was once perceived as a fragility can become a value proposition, as long as it is acknowledged and accurately portrayed. This is where the notion of visible sustainability becomes central.
What travellers say
The study first documents the scale of demand. Of the 6,000 travelers surveyed across six major global markets, 75% say that a hotel’s sustainability commitments are important in their booking decision. More than one in three, precisely 35%, consider them “very important”.
And this concern translates into willingness to pay. Travelers who place importance on this criterion say they are willing to spend an average of 11.7% more per night to stay in an establishment with serious sustainable practices. This represents around $29 more on a $250 room. Among Generation Z travelers, this willingness rises to 14.7%, or almost $37 more per night. Visible sustainability starts here: in a hotel’s ability to communicate why these practices are worth more.
One data point deserves particular attention for the Caribbean: sensitivity to sustainability varies greatly according to source markets. It reaches 93% of travelers surveyed in India and 85% in China, compared to 65% in the UK and Germany. For a region seeking to reduce its dependence on traditional markets, these discrepancies open up a strategic avenue to be handled with caution. These travelers won’t be satisfied with a generic discourse on nature. They’ll be looking for evidence, visible features, documented stories. For the Caribbean, visible sustainability can become a way of speaking to these audiences without denying its local roots.
What hotels do
On the supply side, Amadeus data show a widespread commitment among the hoteliers surveyed. Of the 500 general managers or equivalent profiles consulted across nine countries, all say they plan to spend on sustainability initiatives in the coming year. The average anticipated expenditure represents 6.7% of total company expenditure. And 35% of hoteliers identify sustainability as a key differentiating factor from their competitors.
But the study also highlights a revealing discrepancy. Hotels invest primarily in actions that have an internal operational efficiency rationale: water conservation (33%), sustainable catering supply (33%), responsible supply chains (33%), waste reduction (32%), staff training (32%).
On the other hand, practices that are more visible to the customer, such as renewable energies (28%), biodiversity and community initiatives (27%), and the link between sustainability and loyalty programs (21%), remain less developed. It is this tension that makes visible sustainability strategic: it forces us to move from internal effort to an experience understood by the traveler.
Closing the gap
Joerg Schuler, Head of Global Hospitality Sales at Amadeus, sums up this discrepancy by talking about sustainability as being more “visible, experiential and integrated into the stay”. The formula is important, because it changes the subject. It’s no longer just a question of saying that a hotel consumes less water or reduces its waste. It’s about making these choices understandable, concrete and experienced by the traveler. Visible sustainability therefore requires not only proof, but also an accurate narrative.
This gap is precisely what the Caribbean can bridge. Visible Caribbean sustainability is not an abstract technical program. It can be embodied in visible, relatable, situated practices. Restoring mangroves. Coral reef protection. Local solar energy. Short-distance sourcing from small island producers. Saving water in contexts where the resource is precious. Passing on traditional knowledge of how to use the environment sparingly.
Each of these practices can be both a serious environmental commitment and a story that travelers can experience during their stay. It is this articulation that transforms visible sustainability into perceived value, and thus into pricing leverage.
A value to be documented
A Caribbean hotel that can document, with figures, identified partners and measurable results, its role in restoring a local ecosystem is no longer just selling a room. It’s selling participation in a broader regional project. Travelers surveyed by Amadeus have already indicated their willingness to pay for this. Visible sustainability therefore requires showing what is being done, by whom, with what effects.
This logic goes beyond the individual hotel business. It also concerns destination management bodies, tourism authorities and regional economic players. A region’s ability to credibly communicate its ecological commitment is becoming a competitive variable in the face of other tropical destinations. At destination level, visible sustainability can become a common language for hotels, producers, associations, communities and travellers.
The Caribbean challenge
For the Caribbean, the challenge is not to become sustainable in the sense that other regions understand it. It is to make legible a sustainability that, in many cases, is already practiced at the level of communities, small businesses, local cooperatives and inherited know-how. The global market is willing to pay for it. The question is whether the region will be able to present this reality with the appropriate rigor, coherence and pride.
This series of articles, in its three parts, has attempted to defend the same thesis. The expectations of travelers in 2026 – disconnection, connection to place, visible sustainability – are not constraints that Caribbean players have to endure. They are expectations that the region structurally bears, by virtue of its geography, cultures and history. What remains, as always, is the patient task of putting them into words. This is the editorial mission that Richès Karayib will continue to carry out, alongside the region’s economic, institutional and creative players.
Visible sustainability refers to the set of sustainable commitments that a traveler can actually see, understand or experience during their stay. It’s not just about internal measures, such as reducing water costs or limiting waste behind the scenes. In the Caribbean, this can take the form of solar power clearly integrated into the hotel, a mangrove restoration program, coral reef protection, sourcing from local producers or community actions presented with concrete results. This approach makes the ecological commitment more legible and credible for the traveler.
Visible sustainability can become a competitive advantage as travelers increasingly value hotels’ environmental commitments. According to the data used in the article, a majority of travelers consider these commitments to be important when choosing an establishment, and a proportion are even willing to pay more for serious practices. For Caribbean hotels, the challenge is not only to act, but also to document and tell the story of these actions with precision. An establishment capable of demonstrating its local impact is no longer just selling a room: it is proposing participation in a local project.
Caribbean destinations can better promote their visible sustainability by linking the actions of hotels, producers, associations, local authorities and communities into a coherent narrative. This requires proof: figures, identified partners, measurable results, actions monitored over time. A destination that explains how it protects its reefs, saves water, supports short circuits or restores its ecosystems builds a stronger promise than a simple discourse on nature. For the Caribbean, this storytelling is strategic, as it transforms real climate vulnerability into a cultural, ecological and economic value proposition.
Bamby hasn’t announced a concert date like adding a line to a tour. In a video posted on Instagram, the Guyanese artist spoke of emotion. On October 20, 2026, she will take to the stage at the Élysée Montmartre in Paris, a venue steeped in history. For many fans, this appointment tells more than a musical agenda: it marks a rare milestone for a voice born in French Guiana.
An artist shaped by French Guiana
Behind the stage name Bamby, there’s Ambre Zamor, an artist from French Guiana, associated from the outset with a direct, popular dancehall energy, often carried by the language, attitudes and sound codes of the territory. She came to prominence in 2015 with Real Wifey, in collaboration with Jahyanai, another important figure on the Guyanese scene. This track establishes a clear identity: a female voice, an assertive Caribbean phrasing, a way of addressing her audience without erasing its origin.
Since then, Bamby has made his way outside the most comfortable circuits. Coming from an overseas territory often means crossing two borders. The first is geographical. The second is symbolic: to convince people that the music produced in French Guiana is not peripheral, but capable of dialoguing with the major French, Caribbean and diasporic scenes. On this journey, consistency counts as much as the brilliance of a title.
His case also speaks to young artists working far from decision-making centers. In French Guiana, remoteness complicates travel, professional meetings, national media and meetings with labels. When a singer from this territory reaches a well-known Parisian venue, it doesn’t solve everything. But it does prove that a career path can be built from Cayenne, with its own networks, regional collaborations and an audience that follows even before Paris looks on, without changing the center of gravity.
The appointment that changes the scale
The highlight of 2026 was her nomination for the Flammes. Bamby is presented as the first Guyanese artist to be nominated for this event. This is an important detail. Les Flammes is more than just a showcase: the ceremony has established itself as a place of recognition for rap, RnB, African and Caribbean music and popular culture.
Being nominated in three categories, including female artist of the year, album of the year and album cover of the year, puts Bamby in a highly watched circle. For Guyana, this presence shifts the gaze. It reminds us that the territory produces artists capable of weighing in on national conversations, without renouncing their cultural accent. It also shows something that is often forgotten: the Guyanese scene doesn’t wait to be validated in order to exist. It already exists, but each public recognition gives it a wider surface.
"Not Jealous", the title that confirms
Bamby ‘s progression is also supported by “Pas Jalouse”, his track with Kerchak. The track has been certified a platinum single by SNEP, with a record date of May 28, 2026. Here again, the fact is solid. This is not just perceived popularity on the networks, but official certification in the French music industry.
This success lends another dimension to the Paris concert. L’Élysée Montmartre doesn’t come after a short fashion. It comes after a decade of presence, collaborations, titles broadcast far beyond Cayenne, and a year 2026 where several signals come together: nomination, certification, national exposure, then the Paris scene.
A Parisian date, a Guyanese signal
On October 20, 2026, Bamby won’t be representing all of French Guiana on her own. No single artist carries a territory. But his trajectory can serve as a point of support. It makes visible an ecosystem that is often summed up too quickly, even though it is criss-crossed by dancehall, zouk, urban influences and exchanges with the West Indies, Suriname, Brazil and France.
This concert tells the story of how a French-speaking Caribbean artist expands her space without dissolving. It’s about access to stages, recognition, language and pride. The question is now a simple one: how many other voices from French Guiana will find their way onto these stages after her?
Bamby, whose real name is Ambre Zamor, is a singer from French Guiana, associated with the dancehall scene and Caribbean urban music. Revealed to a wide audience with “Real Wifey”, in collaboration with Jahyanai, she has built a career marked by an assertive Guyanese musical identity. Her nomination for Flammes 2026 gives national visibility to her career path, and serves as a reminder that French Guiana has a music scene capable of dialoguing with the big names in French industry.
Bamby’s nomination for Les Flammes is significant because she is presented as the first Guyanese artist to be nominated for this event. Beyond her individual career, this recognition highlights a territory that is often less exposed in the major national cultural media. It shows that artists from French Guiana are not on the bangs of the French music scene: they are part of it with their own sounds, languages, collaborations and their own way of telling the story of the territory.
Bamby is scheduled to perform in Paris on October 20, 2026, at the Élysée Montmartre. This date marks an important milestone in her year 2026, already boosted by her Flammes nomination and the Platinum certification of “Pas Jalouse”, her track with Kerchak. For his audience, this Paris concert represents more than just a date: it confirms the expansion of his audience and the growing place of Guyanese artists on national stages.
When luxury is more than just décor
For a long time, luxury in the international hotel industry was measured by the thickness of the marble, the height of the ceilings, the scarcity of objects in the rooms. Some of this grammar still exists. But another, potentially more profitable, is emerging. Cultural luxury is gaining in importance. It is measured by the quality of the connection a traveler can establish with the place he or she is visiting.
This evolution is documented in Travel Dreams 2026: From data to delight, a report published by Amadeus in April 2026, based on a survey conducted by Opinium Research in the fourth quarter of 2025. Asked about the sensations they seek in a destination, 24% of the 6,000 travelers cited “connection to a place: food, experiences, special moments”. This was the second most frequent response, behind freedom. As far as hoteliers are concerned, the figure is becoming strategic: 44% of the 500 general managers surveyed across nine countries identified “concierge and guided experiences” as one of the two main drivers of growth in non-room revenues, on a par with social events.
What travellers are really looking for
In other words, what travelers are looking for, and what hoteliers worldwide are beginning to monetize in earnest, is the same thing: access to living culture. Cultural luxury is not just about décor or service levels. It’s about creating the right relationship between the visitor, the area and the people who bring it to life.
The Amadeus report goes further, putting a figure on what it calls “local experience kits”: neighborhood guides, handcrafted souvenirs, connections with cultural players. It estimates that a mid-range hotel could generate over $243,000 in additional annual revenue from this type of service, based on a guide price of $20 per kit. Nearly a third of business travelers who extend their stay for leisure purposes say they are prepared to pay more than 15% above the average rate for this type of service. With this in mind, cultural luxury is also becoming an issue of business model, not just image.
The Caribbean's value is still under-structured
This fact is particularly relevant to the Caribbean. The region’s cultural heritage is alive and well, but still unevenly structured in terms of tourism and hotel offerings. The Kalinago traditions of Dominica, the Creole languages spoken from island to island, the memory of ancient maritime routes, syncretic ritual practices, culinary know-how handed down outside the formal circuits: all this constitutes a capital that still largely escapes the logics of standard hotel valorization. And yet, this is precisely where cultural luxury can find its most solid footing.
Exceptions do exist. Some independent hotels in the Caribbean have long understood that having a traveler dine in a local market, meet with an artisan or enjoy an hour’s silent walk in a heritage district creates a value that is difficult to compare with a standardized spa facility. But these initiatives often remain isolated, barely visible in destination communications, and rarely structured as a coherent economic proposition. To turn cultural luxury into a sustainable lever, we need to move on from one-off initiatives to a clear, profitable offering that respects local players.
Local experiences to be organized differently
The Amadeus report identifies a potentially game-changing trend. According to the study, 41% of hotels surveyed have already created packages linked to regional concerts, cultural events or popular TV series, and 38% plan to do so within the year. The traveler of 2026 no longer comes just to see a place. They come to enter into a relationship with it, through proposals that are constructed, told and embodied. This shift towards cultural luxury is exactly the kind of proposition that the Caribbean can articulate, provided its economic players work together.
This implies a number of shifts. Firstly, we need to move away from competition between islands and think in terms of pan-Caribbean offerings, where the richness of each territory complements rather than cannibalizes each other. Secondly, we need to professionalize the way in which our cultural heritage is presented: not by folklorizing it, but by presenting it with the editorial and visual rigor expected by a well-informed international traveler. Finally, we need to structure the economic relationship between hotels, local cultural players and experience operators, so that the value generated benefits the regions and not just international intermediation platforms. Caribbean cultural luxury can only be as strong as the people who bring it to life.
A journey that also promises personal transformation
Another statistic in the report is worth noting. Asked what they hope to bring back from a trip, 18% of travelers surveyed cite “a new version of themselves: clearer, lighter, more intentional”. This figure rises to 39% among travelers surveyed in China. For Caribbean destinations seeking to diversify their source markets, this signal deserves attention. It does not allow us to generalize to all Asian markets, but it does show that some travelers already associate travel with a form of personal transformation.
Enhancing without diluting
In 2026, cultural luxury is no longer sold in rooms alone. It’s sold in encounters. In hours. In presence. The Caribbean has what it takes to meet these expectations. All that remains is to organize it, to tell its story, to enhance its value without diluting it.
Cultural luxury is a new way of thinking about high-end travel. It’s not just about the comfort of a hotel, the quality of a room or the presence of exclusive amenities. It’s built around the relationship between the traveler and the territory visited. In tourism, this can take the form of a meeting with an artisan, a meal prepared with local produce, a guided tour by a local, or an experience that provides a better understanding of a place’s history, languages, practices and memories. Cultural luxury therefore gives value to that which cannot easily be copied: the living identity of a territory.
Cultural luxury represents a major opportunity for the Caribbean, as the region boasts a rich living heritage: Creole languages, culinary traditions, historical memories, music, craft skills, community practices and indigenous or Afro-descendant heritages. Yet some of this richness remains unstructured in conventional tourism offerings. By developing better-organized local experiences, Caribbean territories can create new revenue streams, boost the attractiveness of their destinations and better involve cultural players in the value generated by tourism. The challenge is not just economic: it also concerns the transmission, recognition and preservation of local identities.
Caribbean hotels can develop cultural luxury by working directly with local players: artisans, guides, chefs, artists, historians, cultural associations, heritage communities and experience operators. The aim is not to turn culture into décor, but to build respectful, rewarding and well-told propositions. This means choosing legitimate partners, presenting traditions accurately, avoiding clichés and guaranteeing that income actually benefits the people who carry this knowledge. A solid cultural luxury doesn’t put culture on display: it creates a fair encounter between the visitor, the place and those who bring it to life.
In New York, Caribbean flags are never seen by chance. In June, they tell a family story, a memory of exile, a sense of belonging that crosses American islands and cities. In Manhattan this Monday, June 1, the Caribbean Tourism Organization officially opens Caribbean Week New York 2026. Business forums, professional meetings, cultural presentations: for five days, from June 1 to 5, the American metropolis becomes one of the major meeting points for the organized Caribbean. And this year, the event takes on a special dimension. Caribbean American Heritage Month marks twenty years of national recognition.
A Caribbean week in the heart of New York City
In 2026, Caribbean Week NY will focus on the theme “One Caribbean: Infinite Experiences”. Caribbean American Heritage Month, on the other hand, focuses more broadly on the idea of memory, identity and unity. Three words sum up the spirit of this year’s Caribbean American Heritage Month. Independence, because Caribbean peoples continue to construct their own narratives. Identity, because it is forged as much in the islands as in the cities of the North. Unity, finally, because Caribbean countries, territories and communities can recognize themselves in a common history without erasing their differences.
Claire Nelson, one of the decisive voices of the Caribbean-American month
Claire Nelson knows this story well. Founder of the Institute of Caribbean Studies in Washington, she championed the idea of a national month dedicated to Caribbean contributions to the United States in the late 1990s. After several years of advocacy, the initiative made headway in Congress with the support of Congresswoman Barbara Lee. In June 2006, President George W. Bush signed the Presidential Proclamation officially recognizing June as Caribbean American Heritage Month in the United States. Without Claire Nelson, without the Institute of Caribbean Studies, without Barbara Lee, this national event would probably not have taken on such importance.
From recognition to visibility
Twenty years on, it’s not just about recognition. It’s visibility. The 2026 program reflects this expansion: Caribbean book fairs, Caribbean Restaurant Week, DC Caribbean Film Festival, then a legislative week from June 8 to 11 with exchanges devoted to Caribbean interests on Capitol Hill. In New York, the New York Public Library is also planning activities during the month, starting with a screening of Bob Marley: One Love on June 1 at the Mott Haven Library in the Bronx.
A Caribbean diaspora that counts in the United States
The U.S. Caribbean diaspora is not marginal in the ethnic mosaic of the United States. According to the Migration Policy Institute, immigrants born in the Caribbean region were estimated to number 5.3 million in the United States in 2024, representing around one tenth of the country’s immigrant population. If descendants born on American soil are added, the Caribbean presence far exceeds the first generation. New York, Miami, Boston, Orlando, Tampa, as well as Washington and Atlanta, are home to structured communities, visible in businesses, churches, associations, local media and cultural events.
Jamaicans, Trinidadians, Haitians, Dominicans, Puerto Ricans, Cubans, Barbadians, Guyanese, Bahamians: the list is long, and each community defends its own identity while participating in a shared pan-Caribbean narrative. This diasporic singularity deserves to be named precisely. Unlike other communities with a single national origin, the Caribbean diaspora in the United States often operates on a dual register: national pride and regional awareness. The month of June does not erase the first sense of belonging. It activates the second. It’s a time when island flags can appear together, from Brooklyn to Little Haiti, without each story losing its voice.
Caribbean figures in American history
American history is itself criss-crossed by Caribbean figures that many still ignore. Alexander Hamilton, the first U.S. Secretary of the Treasury and architect of the American financial system, was born in Nevis, in the British West Indies, before he left for the American colonies. Sidney Poitier, a Bahamian-American actor, became the first black actor to win the Oscar for Best Actor in 1964, for Lilies of the Field. Audre Lorde, poet and leading thinker of black feminism, grew up in New York in a family of Caribbean origin. Colin Powell, America’s first black Secretary of State, was the son of Jamaican parents.
The list continues with Harry Belafonte, Cicely Tyson, Stokely Carmichael (now Kwame Ture), Marcus Garvey and Shirley Chisholm. The latter, the first black woman elected to the US Congress, was born in Brooklyn into a family with roots in Barbados and Guyana. These names do not form a symbolic gallery. They show how the Caribbean has participated, sometimes from the margins, in writing central pages in the political, artistic and social history of the United States.
Guyana, Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago: memories in motion
For the Guyanese diaspora, Caribbean American Heritage Month this year extends the 60th anniversary of Guyana’s independence, marked at the end of May in Brooklyn. In Jamaica, the press revisited the 30th anniversary of the Sinbad Soul Music Festival, associated with Montego Bay and the rise of music tourism aimed at African-American audiences. For Trinidad and Tobago, Caribbean American Heritage Month also spotlights Claudia Jones, a Trinidadian journalist and activist deported from the United States in 1955, considered one of the founding figures of the Caribbean Carnival in London, whose legacy has nourished the Notting Hill Carnival.
A transmission framework for new generations
Twenty years after the 2006 presidential proclamation, Caribbean American Heritage Month is no longer just a calendar or a series of events. It has become a framework for transmission. It enables the diaspora to recognize, document and tell new generations what it means to be Caribbean, American, island, urban, national and regional. The work is not finished. But in 2026, in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Miami, Washington or Boston, millions of Caribbean-Americans are preparing to continue it, each with their own accent, flag and memory.
Each June, Caribbean American Heritage Month is dedicated to recognizing the contributions of Caribbean people and their descendants to the United States. It highlights the history, culture, migratory patterns, public figures and social, artistic and political legacies of the Caribbean. In 2026, it takes on a special dimension, as it marks twenty years of national recognition since the presidential proclamation of 2006.
Caribbean Week NY is important in 2026 because it opens the month of June in a highly symbolic context: the 20th anniversary of Caribbean American Heritage Month. Organized in New York, it brings together tourism players, institutions, diasporic communities and Caribbean representatives with a common goal: to make the Caribbean’s place in the American space more visible. It also shows that culture, tourism and diasporic memory are closely linked.
The Caribbean diaspora plays a major role in the United States, culturally, politically, economically and socially. Present in New York, Miami, Boston, Washington and Atlanta, it brings together communities from Jamaica, Haiti, Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana, Cuba, Puerto Rico, the Dominican Republic, Barbados and the Bahamas. Caribbean American Heritage Month helps us better understand this dual sense of belonging: national pride specific to each island or territory, and a shared Caribbean consciousness.
A global report published in early 2026 by Amadeus reveals what travelers will be looking for in 2026. The Caribbean has always carried it.
There’s a precise moment, in a Caribbean village in the early hours of the morning, when the noise of the world seems to stop. The first lights fall on the facades, a voice answers from one courtyard to another, the smell of coffee mingles with that of the nearby sea. Hardly anyone checks their phone. Life is there, in front of us, denser than any notification. This scene, commonplace for anyone who lives in the Caribbean, is precisely what millions of travellers around the world are now looking for.
When the world is looking to get off the hook
These are the findings of Travel Dreams 2026: From data to delight, a study published in early 2026 by Amadeus, one of the world’s leading technology players in tourism. Conducted by Opinium Research among 6,000 travelers in Australia, China, Germany, India, the UK and the USA, the survey identifies a profound shift in contemporary expectations.
Asked what makes them feel they’ve reached their dream destination, 32% of travelers say “when I stop looking at my phone because real life is more interesting”. This is the top answer, far ahead of the others. Another statistic from the same report extends this observation: 41% of travellers say they want to return from their trip with “a refreshed brain and a calmed nervous system”.
Travel as a response to collective exhaustion
These figures are not anecdotal. They tell of a collective exhaustion. In a world saturated with screens, high-performance productivity and manufactured urgency, travel is no longer a trophy to be collected, but a means of rediscovering a quality of presence. The Amadeus report puts it bluntly: travelers are looking to feel “genuinely alive, not just ticking off landmarks”.
What the Caribbean has always carried
This shift in expectations is global, but it offers the Caribbean a special reading. The region didn’t wait for a study to cultivate what the market is rediscovering today. The density of the Caribbean present, the thickness of a conversation on a doorstep, the slowness of a shared meal, the way in which the landscape imposes its rhythm on those who cross it, is not a marketing strategy. It’s a heritage. It comes from languages, from multiple spiritual heritages, from a long relationship with the sea and the land, from the memory of the peoples who made these islands.
Four global expectations already present in the region
The same Amadeus study identifies four main sensations sought by travellers from a destination: freedom (29%), connection to a place (24%), discovery (22%) and ease (17%). Structurally, the Caribbean offers these four dimensions without having to transform itself. The freedom of open itineraries, connection to places that still resist tourist standardization, ongoing discovery – each island has its own language, its own rhythms, its own history – and the ease of hospitality that is measured not in added services but in the attention paid.
Breaking out of the generic imaginary
The challenge, then, is not for the Caribbean to invent a new offer. It’s about making visible what it already has. All too often, the communication of Caribbean destinations remains trapped in a generic imaginary of beaches, palm trees and sunshine, which says nothing about the real depth of the experience. But what the Amadeus report documents is precisely the end of this imaginary world. Travelers are no longer asking for a postcard. They’re asking for a return to themselves.
A strategic window of opportunity for Caribbean players
For the region’s economic players – DMOs, independent hoteliers, cultural operators, tourism ministries – this global data opens up a strategic window. It validates an intuition that has been circulating in the region for years: the Caribbean doesn’t have to chase global tourism trends. On the contrary, it needs to strongly articulate what sets it apart. Silence is no longer lack. Slowness is no longer delay. The density of a local presence, handed down from generation to generation, is becoming a major economic asset in a market desperate for the real thing.
That leaves us with a question that sets the scene for the next pages in this series. If the Caribbean does indeed have what the world is looking for in 2026, what’s stopping it from saying it with the appropriate force?
Caribbean tourism 2026 responds to a growing expectation: travel to slow down, reconnect with real life and regain mental balance. The Amadeus report highlights travelers who are no longer looking just for landscapes, but for a sense of presence, calm and connection with a place. The Caribbean already possesses these elements in its villages, languages, daily rhythms, community ties, relationship with the sea and different ways of inhabiting time.
The Caribbean can distinguish itself by moving away from a form of communication too limited to beaches, sunshine and postcards. Its strength lies in the depth of its territories: memories, languages, culinary traditions, music, spirituality, inhabited landscapes and human relationships. In 2026, travelers are looking for authenticity, freedom and connection to place. So it’s in the region’s interest to tell a better story about what it already has, rather than copying global tourism trends.
This evolution concerns tourist offices, independent hotels, guides, cultural operators, restaurateurs, craftsmen, local authorities and tourism ministries. Everyone can contribute to repositioning Caribbean tourism 2026 around experiences that are more human, more rooted and more faithful to the territories. The challenge is not only to attract more visitors, but also to make the most of what makes each island unique, while creating fairer economic benefits for local communities.
The Bushinengués carry a history born of flight, forest and reconstruction. In Papaïchton, on the Maroni River, Carlos Adaoudé, known as Kalyman, sculpts and paints forms inspired by the decorations that adorned traditional Bushinengue homes. Adaoudé is a sculptor. But he is also a transmitter of memory: each piece he creates is an extension of the know-how that has enabled an entire culture to survive slavery and contemporary upheavals.
In this art, nothing is merely decorative. Lines, colors and geometric shapes tell of a way of inhabiting the world. They carry signs, messages and memories. Tembé reads like a memory transmitted by wood, color and gesture.
Free societies born of marronnage
The Bushinengués, or Bushinenge as they are spelled, are the descendants of enslaved Africans who escaped from the plantations of Suriname, then a Dutch colony, in the 17th and 18th centuries. In the forest interior, they built autonomous societies based on African heritages, local adaptations and knowledge forged through resistance.
This story is not just about escape. It’s also about political organization, military strategies, alliances and negotiations. The resistance of the maroon groups led the Dutch colonial authorities to sign several peace treaties: with the Ndyuka, also known as Okanisi, in 1760, with the Saamaka in 1762, then with the Matawai in 1767.
Today, there are generally six major Bushinengue groups: the Saamaka, the Ndyuka or Okanisi, the Aluku or Boni, the Paamaka, the Matawai and the Kwinti. Their history lies mainly between Suriname and French Guiana. The Maroni, called Marowijne on the Surinamese side, remains one of the central axes of this history.
The Maroni, a land of life and transmission
In French Guiana, the Bushinengue communities have a strong presence in western Guyana, particularly along the Maroni River. Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni, Apatou, Grand-Santi, Papaïchton and Maripasoula are just some of the places where this presence can be seen in languages, families, canoes, houses and links with neighboring Suriname.
The river is more than just an administrative boundary. For the people who live along its banks, it is a route, a memory and a living space. Exchanges, markets, kinships and cultural practices are a reminder that the history of the Bushinengués is first and foremost understood from the river.
Tembé, an everyday art turned heritage
One of the most visible expressions of Bushinengue material culture is the tembé. This graphic art, sculpted or painted, is linked to the Maroon peoples of Guyana and Suriname. It is expressed on wood, canvas, gourds, fabrics, everyday objects and elements of the traditional habitat.
Traditionally, Tembé motifs adorned pirogues, paddles, benches, combs, doors, house facades and pediments. In some communes of the Maroni, notably Apatou, Maripasoula and especially Papaïchton, traditional houses called ossu had a decorated pediment, the kopo.
In 2020, tembé was included in France’s National Inventory of Intangible Cultural Heritage. This recognition gives institutional visibility to a practice long passed down through families, villages and everyday objects. It also serves as a reminder that this heritage is not static. It continues to evolve and inspire new generations.
Languages that carry history
Another Bushinengue singularity has to do with languages. In French Guiana, institutional references recognize Neng(e), with its Aluku, Ndyuka and Pamaka components, as well as Saamaka among the languages of France. Sranan tongo, a Surinamese Creole, is also spoken in western Guyana.
These languages are more than just means of communication. They carry a memory of marooning, migrations and relations between the shores. They speak of the world from a specific historical experience: that of peoples who have rebuilt a free society far from the plantations.
Institutional recognition still fragile
The place of Bushinengués in Guiana’s institutional life has gradually been affirmed. The Conseil consultatif des populations amérindiennes et bushinenge was created in 2008. The Grand Conseil coutumier des populations amérindiennes et bushinenges de Guyane then reinforced this recognition.
The land issue remains central. In French Guiana, Zones de Droits d’Usage Collectifs, collective concessions and collective cessions are tools of French law. They recognize certain collective uses linked to forestry, hunting, fishing, gathering and abattis. However, they are still subject to administrative arbitration and local tensions.
A culture facing the challenges of the present
The future of Bushinengue communities also depends on the environment. The pressure of illegal gold mining, mercury pollution, river damage and tensions surrounding the forest are weighing heavily on the inland territories of Guyana.
But the history of the Bushinengués is not just a history of threats. It’s also a story of creation. Tembé continues to invent itself. Languages continue to circulate. Families, associations, customary authorities and inhabitants of the Maroni continue to pass on knowledge that goes beyond heritage.
The Bushinengués carry an essential Caribbean memory. Their story is a reminder that freedom was not achieved by decree alone. It was also built in the forest, on the rivers, in the languages, in the homes, in the objects and in the gestures handed down.
The Bushinengués are the descendants of Maroon communities formed by enslaved Africans who escaped from the plantations of Suriname in the 17th and 18th centuries. They built autonomous societies in the forest interior, mainly between Suriname and Guyana. Their history is linked to marronage, the Maroni River, Bushinengue Creole languages and a strong material culture, of which tembé is one of the most visible expressions.
Tembé is much more than a decorative art form. Among the Bushinengués, it appears on canoes, paddles, benches, combs, doors and house pediments. Its geometric motifs convey a memory, an identity and a way of linking generations. Listed in France’s Inventaire national du patrimoine culturel immatériel in 2020, tembé is testimony to a living heritage that is still practiced, reinterpreted and transmitted in French Guiana.
The Bushinengue people live mainly in Suriname and French Guiana, with a particularly strong presence in western Guyana, along the Maroni River. Communes such as Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni, Apatou, Grand-Santi, Papaïchton and Maripasoula are linked to this history. The Maroni River plays a central role, linking families, languages, cultural practices and traffic between the two banks.
Repeal of the “Code Noir”: behind this legal formula lies a much deeper issue than the vote on an old text. On May 20, 2026, the National Assembly’s Law Commission adopted the proposal put forward by Max Mathiasin, MP for Guadeloupe. The text is due to be examined in a public session on May 28, 2026. The aim is not to abolish slavery a second time – it was definitively abolished in 1848 – but to expressly remove from the French legal system a text that organized enslavement in the French colonies.
Before repeal, understanding the Code Noir
The “Code Noir” is not simply a dusty document reserved for legal historians. It refers first and foremost to the royal decree of March 1685 on slaves in the American islands, and then to all the texts that extended it, notably in 1723 and 1724.
The “Bibliothèque nationale de France” presents it as a law concerning relations between masters and slaves in the French colonies of America, with the creation of a derogatory colonial law.
This text did not invent colonial slavery.
But it gave it a legal framework. It provided a framework for the condition of enslaved people, imposed religion, work, family, sanctions, relations with masters and daily life on plantations.
In other words, the “Code Noir” made slavery administrable.
He transformed economic and social violence into a system governed by royal law.
This is why the Abrogation of the “Code noir” cannot be read as a simple technical operation.
It concerns the way in which a state looks at the texts it has produced, even when these texts no longer govern present-day life.
The Comité national pour la mémoire et l’histoire de l’esclavage (National Committee for the Memory and History of Slavery) points out that for over a century and a half, this body of law organized slave society in the French colonies of the Caribbean, the Indian Ocean and Louisiana.
A text without effect, but not without weight
Since its abolition in 1848, the “Code Noir” no longer has any legal effect. None of its articles can be applied today. The danger would therefore be to make people believe that it still existed as an active rule. This is not the case. The issue lies elsewhere: the ordinance of 1685 and the texts that extended it were not expressly repealed in the terms covered by the current proposal.
It is this paradox that gives current events their force. A text can be legally dead and still be symbolically powerful. It may no longer produce law, but continue to wound through its presence in national legal history. On the 25th anniversary of the Taubira law, the Élysée supported its repeal, stating that it was not a question of erasing history, but of making it clear that this text is contrary to equal human dignity.
Why does this news speak to the French West Indies and French Guiana?
The roots are to be found in Guadeloupe, Martinique, French Guiana and La Réunion, but also in the families that still bear the traces of a history handed down sometimes without archives, sometimes without words.
The “Code Noir” is not an abstraction for these territories. It refers to imposed names, severed lineages, dwellings, registers and incomplete family accounts. It reminds us that slavery was not just an exploitation of bodies. It was also a fabrication of statuses, silences and inequalities inscribed over time.
The fact that this proposal was put forward by Max Mathiasin, MP for Guadeloupe, is no detail. The Law Commission unanimously adopted the text, after its author presented it as an additional milestone for the memory of slavery. A voice from the French overseas territories is thus bringing to parliament a demand that goes beyond the symbolic: to name, to remove, to pass on.
What repeal can really open up
The Abrogation of the “Code noir” does not in itself repair the violence of slavery. It does not settle the question of reparations, which Max Mathiasin did not wish to include in the text so as not to blur its message. But it can open up a more concrete avenue: that of education, archives and places of remembrance.
The text under review calls for a report to be submitted to Parliament. The report will cover not only the provisions stemming from colonial law, but also the place given to the history of slavery, the slave trade and its abolition in school curricula. The commission also added elements on memorial sites and historical research.
Removing the text is not enough. We still need to explain what it enabled, how it shaped colonial societies, why its effects can still be read in memories, and how younger generations can receive this history without it being reduced to a commemorative date.
Remove text, keep memory open
The Abrogation of the “Code Noir” does not close the book on history. On the contrary, it forces it to return to the public arena with greater clarity. To repeal does not mean to forget. It means officially removing from French law a text that gave legal form to enslavement, while leaving historians, teachers, museums and families with the responsibility of passing it on.
For the French West Indies, French Guiana and the other territories concerned, the stakes are twofold: obtain an official act, but refuse to let this act become an end in itself. After the Abrogation of the Code Noir, the real question remains: how can we teach this history without softening it, without freezing it, and without letting future generations discover it only at the bend of a parliamentary news item?
Abrogation of the Code Noir means the formal withdrawal of this text from the French legal system. The Code Noir has had no legal effect since the definitive abolition of slavery in 1848, but had not been expressly repealed. This step does not therefore change the current legal life of citizens, but it does carry a strong memorial value. It marks the official withdrawal of a text that organized colonial slavery in the former French colonies.
The Abrogation of the Code Noir directly concerns the territories inherited from French colonial slavery, notably Guadeloupe, Martinique, French Guiana and Reunion Island. In these territories, the Code Noir refers to a family, social and memory history that is still sensitive: imposed names, incomplete archives, plantation societies, colonial hierarchies and sometimes difficult transmission. For the French West Indies and French Guiana, this repeal is not just a legal act. It involves the recognition of a history that has long been written into texts, places and memories.
No, the Abrogation of the Code Noir does not erase the history of slavery. On the contrary, it can reinforce the need to teach it better, document it better and pass it on better. Repealing a text does not mean removing it from archives or historical works. It means that the State officially recognizes that this text, which gave legal form to enslavement, no longer has a place in the symbolic order of law. The next challenge is to keep this memory alive in schools, museums, research centers and families.
The Kali’na of French Guiana have been part of the history of coastal Guyana since well before colonial times, but all too often they have been relegated to the margins of the great discourses on the territory. However, among the Kali’na, history does not live only in books: it continues in a language that is still spoken, in villages where memory remains anchored, in cultural practices that are still present, and in a relationship with the land that has never ceased to structure collective life.
If their names are back in the news today, it’s because an old colonial drama is resurfacing at the heart of public debate. To understand this moment, we need to look beyond a parliamentary sequence: we need to return to a living people, to a wounded memory, and to a transmission that, despite the ruptures of history, has never disappeared.
Who are the Kali'na of French Guiana?
The Kali’na of French Guiana are one of the six Amerindian peoples present in French Guiana. Their historical presence is concentrated mainly on the coast and in western Guiana, notably around Awala-Yalimapo, Mana, Saint-Laurent-du-Maroni and Iracoubo, with reports of their presence towards Cayenne and Kourou. Their language, Kali’na, belongs to the Carib family. It is the only Amerindian language of French Guiana to be spoken in five territories: Venezuela, Guyana, Suriname, French Guiana and Brazil. The very word “Kali’na” refers to a strong self-designation, meaning “man, human being”.
This fact alone is enough to shift the gaze. The Kali’na of French Guiana are neither a heritage decoration nor a frozen survival. They belong fully to the territory’s present. Their history is that of a people whose coastal roots go back a long way, whose regional ties extend beyond today’s borders, and who, from the 16th century onwards, had to come to terms with the arrival of the European powers while preserving their own logic of alliance, circulation and transmission.
Why does the memory of the Kali'na matter today?
Kali’na memory is important today because it affects the way Guyana looks at its human foundations. For a long time, indigenous peoples were only mentioned in a secondary way in institutional narratives, as if they belonged first and foremost to the past. Yet Kali’na culture is still passed on in language, in stories, in family references and in bilingual educational materials, showing that this presence remains active. Also in 2024, educational resources in Kali’na and French were published based on stories rooted in the daily life of Awala-Yalimapo, a sign that transmission is not just a matter of memory, but also of the present.
This is what gives the current debate such profound significance. When a people continues to keep its language and cultural references alive, the question of ancestors cannot be reduced to an administrative issue. It touches on the continuity of a community, the dignity of its dead and the place accorded to its history in the public arena.
What happened in 1882 and 1892?
One of the most violent episodes in this history dates back to the end of the 19th century. In 1882 and again in 1892, Kali’na and Arawak from French Guiana were exhibited in Paris as part of ethnographic displays now recognized as part of the history of “human zoos”. These are not mere dates in a colonial chronology: they refer to displaced men, women and children, exposed to the public gaze and stripped of their humanity in the name of so-called scientific or exotic curiosity.
This memory has not remained theoretical. In the explanatory memorandum to the bill under discussion today, it is recalled that a request was made by the Moliko Alet+Po association for the return to French Guiana of human remains of Kali’nas people who had died in mainland France while being exhibited. The text specifies that six skeletons and two casts are involved, kept at the Musée de l’Homme. This clarification gives the affair particular force: colonial history is not only recounted, it is also materially present in public collections.
Why has Iracoubo become such an important place of memory?
Iracoubo has become a major place of remembrance since the inauguration, on August 11, 2024, of two statues in tribute to pi’pi Ahieramo, pi’pi Molko and the 47 Kali’na and Arawak exhibited in 1882 and 1892 at the Jardin Zoologique d’Acclimatation in Paris. This memorial has more than just a symbolic function. It inscribes a long-suppressed or relegated history into the Guyanese landscape, and gives descendants a place to reflect, to speak and to pass on.
Iracoubo thus becomes much more than a place of remembrance. The site links generations, brings history closer to the land, and reminds us that recognition also requires concrete gestures: naming, commemorating, transmitting, making visible. In a territory where colonial wounds have often been told from the outside, this reappropriation has considerable significance.
What is the current status of restitution?
The dossier reached a precise milestone in the spring of 2026. The draft law on the decommissioning of Kali’nas human remains and their return to the Guiana collectivity for burial purposes was submitted to the Senate on October 3, 2024. Visit April 13, 2026At the French National Assembly, Culture Minister Catherine Pégard confirmed the government’s support for this initiative. Visit April 15, 2026The accelerated procedure has been initiated. The text is due to be debated in a public session of the Senate on May 18, 2026.
This is not yet an effective return. The legislative process is not yet complete. The text provides for the removal from public collections of eight Kali’nas remains held at the Musée de l’Homme, and their return to the Guiana collectivity within a year of the law’s entry into force, for burial purposes. If a specific text was needed, it’s because the law of December 26, 2023 on the restitution of human remains belonging to public collections was designed for requests made by foreign states, and not for a French territory like French Guiana.
For the Kali’na of French Guiana, the issue goes beyond parliamentary law. It’s about dignity, reparation and how a people can finally hope to bring their dead back to their land. Through this sequence, an entire memory refuses to be kept at arm’s length.
The Kali’na of French Guiana are one of the Amerindian peoples who have been present in French Guiana for centuries. Their history is closely linked to the coast, particularly in western Guiana, where their culture, language and traditions continue to be passed on. To speak of the Kali’na of French Guiana is to recall that they are a living people, rooted in their territory and in a memory still carried on by current generations.
The memory of the Kali’na of French Guiana is important today because it provides a better understanding of an essential part of Guyanese history that has often remained in the shadows. It concerns not only the past, but also the present: language, family stories, places of memory and cultural transmission show that this history remains profoundly alive. It also reflects a demand for dignity for ancestors who were long treated with disrespect.
In 1882 and 1892, Kali’na and Arawak people from French Guiana were exhibited in Paris at ethnographic exhibitions now associated with the history of “human zoos”. This episode is one of the most painful in colonial history, as it reduced men, women and children to objects of public curiosity. It is this historical violence that still today explains the emotion and importance of the struggle to remember their ancestors.
Iracoubo has become a major place of remembrance in French Guiana since the inauguration, in 2024, of a memorial to the Kali’na and Arawak people exhibited at the end of the 19th century. This place of remembrance gives a tangible presence to a history long relegated to silence. It also makes it possible to inscribe this memory in Guyanese territory, as close as possible to the descendants and communities concerned.
An important milestone was reached in April 2026, when the French government declared its support for a bill providing for the return of Kali’na human remains to French Guiana. At this stage, the actual return has not yet been achieved, as the legislative process must be completed. But this step marks a major turning point: it recognizes that these human remains are not mere collector’s items, but ancestors whose return has been awaited for over a century.
The Loto du Patrimoine 2026 is more than just a list of endangered monuments. For the Caribbean territories, this selection highlights three sites that each bear a sensitive part of local history: the Maison de l’historien Lacour in Basse-Terre, Guadeloupe, the former mill of the Loyola dwelling in Rémire-Montjoly, French Guiana, and the church of Notre-Dame-de-la-Visitation in Gros-Morne, Martinique. The French Ministry of Culture has selected them as one of the 18 emblematic regional sites for the 2026 edition.
Why the Loto du Patrimoine 2026 is important for the Caribbean
For a media attentive to the Caribbean, this selection has a particular significance. It shows that the Loto du Patrimoine 2026 doesn’t just fund technical worksites: it also supports places that structure collective memory, urban identity, historical narratives and cultural transmission. Since 2018, the Mission Patrimoine lottery has raised over 210 million euros and supported 1,080 sites; 70% of projects have now been saved or are on the verge of being saved, and 500 worksites have been completed.
In this context, Guadeloupe, French Guiana and Martinique appear as three very different but complementary cases. One relates to intellectual and urban history, the other to the plantation economy and archaeology, and the third to the persistence of a religious heritage marked by natural disasters. It is this crossover that gives the Loto du Patrimoine 2026 its real significance in the Caribbean.
Guadeloupe: Auguste Lacour's house, a heritage challenge for Basse-Terre
In Basse-Terre, the Loto du Patrimoine 2026 awards the Maison de l’historien Lacour, a house linked to Auguste Lacour, a major figure in Guadeloupean history. It’s a small, modest colonial building, similar to a Creole hut, but now badly damaged and at risk of advanced deterioration. The project involves not only the complete restoration of the house, but also the ashlar fountain, the wrought-iron gate and the vegetable garden. Work is scheduled to start in the second half of 2026, with completion scheduled for December 2027.
The interest of this site goes far beyond the mere preservation of an ancient building. The house has been used for a number of purposes: as a historian’s residence, as a birthplace, then as an interpretation center within the framework of the Ville d’Art et d’Histoire label. Listed as a historic monument in 2016, the house and its surroundings could be used for a tourism or cultural project in the future, helping to revitalize Basse-Terre’s town center. With this in mind, the Loto du Patrimoine 2026 also acts as a lever for urban reactivation.
French Guiana: Loyola, a mill at the heart of a wider history
In French Guiana, the Loto du Patrimoine 2026 focuses on the former mill of the Loyola dwelling in Rémire-Montjoly. The aim is to restore the entire mill, including its wind intake, transmission and grinding mechanisms. Work is scheduled to start at the end of 2026 and be completed in 2027.
But the real strength of this site lies in its historical depth. The Loyola dwelling, acquired by the Jesuits in 1668, is presented as the largest slave dwelling in French Guiana. The mill is therefore not an isolated vestige: it is part of a whole that sheds light on sugar production, colonial organization and the reality of slave labor. Since 1994, archaeologists have been studying the site, part of which remains to be discovered. The Loto du Patrimoine 2026 gives visibility to a site where built heritage, colonial memory and historical research meet in a very direct way.
Martinique: in Gros Morne, the urgent need to save a weakened church
In Martinique, the site selected for the Loto du Patrimoine 2026 is the Notre-Dame-de-la-Visitation church in Gros-Morne. Built in 1743, it has been closed to the public since 2016 and no longer complies with paraseismic standards since it was weakened by the earthquake of September 29, 2009. The announced works will secure the main nave and aisles, restore the two sacristies and the forechoir, as well as the choir and nave enclosure. Start-up is scheduled for summer 2026, with completion scheduled for 2027.
Here again, heritage interest goes far beyond religious architecture. Today’s parish is the result of successive reconstructions after cyclones, earthquakes and other hazards. Its history reflects that of a Martinican society forced to constantly adapt its heritage to the island’s natural realities. Against this backdrop, the Loto du Patrimoine 2026 awards a building that embodies both faith and resilience.
Three territories, three interpretations of heritage
By selecting Guadeloupe, French Guiana and Martinique, the Loto du Patrimoine 2026 is in fact drawing up three ways of thinking about heritage in the French Caribbean region: preserving a literary house in the heart of a town, restoring a major vestige linked to the history of slavery and the sugar industry, and saving a church marked by the ravages of time and nature. This trio reminds us that a monument only has meaning if it remains legible for local residents, useful for the region and capable of transmitting a complete history, even in its most difficult areas.
In the French Caribbean, three territories are involved in the Loto du Patrimoine 2026: Guadeloupe, French Guiana and Martinique. These three sites are included in the official list of 18 emblematic regional sites announced by the French Ministry of Culture.
In Guadeloupe, the chosen site is the Maison de l’historien Lacour in Basse-Terre. The project involves restoring the house, the ashlar fountain, the wrought-iron gate and the kitchen garden. Work is due to start in the second half of 2026, with completion scheduled for December 2027.
The former mill of the Loyola dwelling in Rémire-Montjoly is a major heritage site, bearing witness to the history of sugar production, the Jesuit presence and the slave system in French Guiana. The Fondation du Patrimoine points out that the Loyola dwelling, acquired in 1668 by the Jesuits, is considered to be the largest slave dwelling in French Guiana. The selected project aims at a complete restoration of the mill and its mechanism.
In Martinique, the selected site is the Notre-Dame-de-la-Visitation church in Gros-Morne. Built in 1743, it has been closed to the public since 2016 and was weakened by the earthquake of September 29, 2009, making restoration work particularly urgent.
The Loto du Patrimoine 2026 is used to provide financial support for monuments and sites in peril identified throughout France, including overseas territories. The Mission Patrimoine scheme, launched in 2018, has already supported 1,080 sites since its inception, with 500 worksites completed and 70% of projects saved or in the process of being saved.
On Saturday March 28, at the Centre Aquatique Pierre Samot in Le Lamentin, the CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 press conference was more than just an information meeting. Over the course of an hour and a half, organizers, athletes and partners presented much more than just the sporting program: from April 3 to 8, Martinique will host the 39th edition of the Caribbean’s leading junior aquatic event, ten years after the first edition was so memorable. Twenty-four nations. Three disciplines. A home territory that knows it.
A bid driven by collective memory
In 2024, at the Caribbean Aquatics Association Congress held in the Bahamas, two bids were put forward to host the 2026 CARIFTA Aquatics Championships: Saint Lucia and Martinique. The vote was clear-cut: some thirty votes for Martinique, ten for Saint Lucia.
Behind this result is a story. The 2016 edition, the first ever to be held on home soil, left its mark on the minds of all those who were there: coaches, delegation leaders, officials. In 2024, when it came time to vote, many still remembered that week.
"It was a beautiful edition, and one that will always be remembered."
The other factor was more concrete: Sainte-Lucie did not yet have its own pool. Martinique, on the other hand, can count on the Centre Aquatique Pierre Samot in Le Lamentin, with its ten-lane Olympic pool, 800-seat grandstand and 25-meter warm-up pool. One of the best facilities in the Caribbean.
The organization also emphasized its capacity to welcome delegations from outside the basin, with several accommodation solutions mobilized in the south of the island, supplemented by other structures if necessary. This logistical aspect, rarely secondary in this type of event, reinforced the credibility of Martinique’s bid.
Three disciplines, 24 nations, a demanding format
The CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 will bring together 24 countries: 21 English-speaking Caribbean nations, plus Martinique, Guadeloupe and Guyana. The swimming races will take place over four days: heats in the morning, finals in the afternoon, from Saturday April 5 to Tuesday April 8. Artistic swimming gets underway on Monday during the lunch break, with solos followed by technical events. The duets and teams round off the program on Wednesday morning. On the same Wednesday, the open water event takes place over five kilometers in the Anses d’Arlets.
Competitors: Benjamins (11-12 years), Minimes (13-14 years), Cadets (15-17 years) do not enter as individuals. They are national selections, with the best swimmers from each territory. To enter the Martinique selection, swimmers must satisfy a time grid established over the previous two seasons, which only selects swimmers capable of reaching the finals.
In the minds of the organizers, selection is based on a simple logic: to score points, you have to enter the final, and to enter the final, you have to be among the top eight times in the morning heats. In other words, the swimmers selected are supposed to have a level that enables them to play a real role in the competition, and not just participate.
The Martinique delegation at the CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 has 61 swimmers: 36 in racing, 12 in open water, five of whom also race, and 18 in artistic swimming. The team is led by five captains: Jean-Naël Zozime and Maxime Auguste-Charlery for boys’ racing (15-17 age group), Cyrielle Manin and Sayanne Guivissa for girls’ racing, and Nohemy Marajo for artistic swimming.
Water as starting point and destination
When asked how he got started, Jean-Naël Zozime, captain of the boys’ selection, answers straightforwardly: “I was introduced to swimming so that I wouldn’t drown. Cyrielle Manin, captain of the girls’ selection, tells much the same story: she almost drowned as a child, and that’s what led her to learn to swim.
These two testimonies, heard just a few minutes apart, say something important about this territory. Two young Martiniquans, initially frightened by the sea, who are now representing their island against twenty-three Caribbean nations. This is more than just a sporting achievement.
"Swimming is a tough sport. You can't expect it to be easy, but with a lot of perseverance, anyone can do it."
Nohemy Marajo, artistic swimming captain, has been practicing for ten years a discipline that the public still knows little about. She explains it concretely: learning choreographies on dry land, rehearsing them in the water, controlling your breathing under the surface while your legs draw figures above. It’s a sport that’s as technically demanding as it is physically demanding, and has as much to do with ballet as it does with endurance.
"You have to know how to endure, how to save every last breath to finish the choreography."
The conference of the CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 also pointed out that artistic swimming is still a confidential discipline in the Caribbean, due to the infrastructure it requires and the level of preparation required. It requires three-dimensional work and very thorough technical preparation, as well as the support of outside professionals, particularly in dance and gymnastic preparation. For the supervisors, the challenge of CARIFTA is twofold: to support those who are already practising and to encourage new vocations.
What the coaching team observes in these youngsters is a constant: they train, take their exams, compete at weekends, and do it all over again. “Generally, swimmers perform well in their studies too, because they’ve worked on this rigor on a daily basis.” What you learn in the pool also applies elsewhere, and the organizers insist on this daily requirement: it’s not enough to qualify, you have to be able to show up on the day, in a sport where regularity and discipline count as much as talent.
Medals from the hands of the island
The way an event rewards its champions often says a lot about what it stands for. At the CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026, the medals were made in Martinique from noble woods: pearwood for gold, mao bleu for silver, mao ghani for bronze. A craftsman from the Nord-Atlantique region produced them, Joseph Galliard signed the engravings, and a local seamstress made the pouches in the three colors of the Martinican flag.
The initiative was spearheaded by the event’s godmother, Coralie Balmy, a former top-level swimmer who had taken part in the CARIFTA four times in her career. An eco-responsible and identity-affirming initiative, hailed as a first on the Caribbean scale.
Every Caribbean athlete who reaches the podium at the CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 will leave with a piece of Martinique, a unique medal made by local craftsmen, unlike any other.
The conference also specified that trophies would accompany these awards, and that the medals had yet to receive their lanyards before the competition opened. Here too, the aim is clear: to make each award a sporting, local and symbolic object.
A week that mobilizes the whole territory
The CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 won’t just be played out in the pools. Between 1,500 and 1,800 people are arriving in Martinique: swimmers, staff and families spread out over several hotels in the south of the island. Every day, around 150 volunteers ensure the smooth running of the event: former swimmers, parents, locals who sometimes have no direct connection with swimming, but who wanted to get involved.
Among them, the officials play a decisive role: some 26 officials from the Caribbean will reinforce the Martinique officials, bringing the number of people around the pool to around fifty for each morning and afternoon meeting. In addition, there will be first-aid attendants, reception teams, people in charge of awards, delegation escorts and areas open to the public.
Welcoming delegations to the CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 was also thought through in detail. They all had to arrive on April 2, at different times of the day, sometimes very early in the morning, sometimes late at night. In conjunction with the transport company and SAMAC, a precise plan was drawn up at the airport to ensure smooth exits, transfers to buses and settling into accommodation, with particular attention paid to meals depending on the time of arrival.
The opening ceremony of the CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026, on Friday April 3 at the Georges Gratiant stadium, is free and open to all: 2,800 seats to fill. The group “Nou Pa Sav” will accompany the parade of delegations. On Saturday, April 4, Les Hommes d’Argile will be on hand as the delegations arrive on site, offering a strong cultural backdrop intended as a symbolic first encounter with Martinican identity. Throughout the week, Martinican cultural groups will be on hand to ensure that visitors leave with a living image of the region, not just competition results.
The CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 ceremony is scheduled to take place from 4 to 6 p.m., and will be broadcast on a giant screen, as well as relayed by media partners and via YouTube for wider distribution in the Caribbean. The ambition is clear: to make Martinique the center of the Caribbean for the duration of the event.
In addition to sport, the organizers of the CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 also have an economic and cultural objective. Bringing in up to 1,800 people means filling accommodation, generating consumption, encouraging car rentals and putting the hotel and restaurant sectors to work. It’s also a way of showcasing Martinique’s culture, notably through the entertainment planned for the opening ceremony and the arrival of the delegations.
The open water event at Anses d’Arlets also serves as a reminder that the sea is a living, fragile environment that deserves protection. The association’s representative at the conference sums up its mission simply: “learn to swim to discover the seas and protect them.”
This educational dimension goes beyond drowning prevention. It also touches on the appropriation of water by the people of Martinique, the discovery of the discipline by the youngest and the broader desire to reinforce the region’s aquatic culture in the long term.
An assertive island
A phrase uttered at the end of the conference sums up the general mood: “We’re ready, and we’ll make the CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 a collective success and a great source of pride for our region.”
What the delegations take away with them on the evening of April 8 is more than just a ranking. It’s an image of Martinique, a territory that knows how to welcome, organize and assert its identity. For six days, the whole Caribbean will be there. It’s up to Martinique to show what it can do.
But the organizers of the CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 also want to leave their mark after the event. The Ligue de Natation de Martinique ended the 2024-2025 season with some 2,540 members, around ten affiliated clubs and, generally speaking, 7 to 8 clubs involved in competition. With this in mind, the CARIFTAs are not intended as a parenthesis, but rather as a possible catalyst to encourage vocations, boost membership and establish swimming as a permanent fixture on the Martinique sports scene.
The organizers of the CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 have also chosen not to reproduce the large village of 2016. In 2026, the activities surrounding the competition are to be more focused, with one day in particular being highlighted, in order to concentrate energy and attendance rather than scattering the highlights.
The CARIFTA Aquatics Championships 2026 is the 39th edition of the Caribbean’s leading junior aquatic event, held in Martinique from April 3 to 8. Twenty-four nations are taking part in racing, artistic and open water swimming, in categories ranging from 11 to 17 years of age.
The swimming race and artistic swimming events take place at the Centre Aquatique Pierre Samot in Le Lamentin. The 5-kilometer open water event takes place in Anses d’Arlets on Wednesday April 8.
Tickets are available on cariftamartinique2026.com and on the Ligue de Natation de Martinique social networks. Prices: €10 in the morning, €20 in the afternoon for adults, 4-day pass at €125. The opening ceremony at the Georges Gratiant stadium is free of charge.
Twenty-four countries are taking part: 21 English-speaking Caribbean nations, plus Martinique, Guadeloupe and Guyana.
The Martinique squad is led by five captains: Jean-Naël Zozime and Maxime Auguste-Charlery for boys’ racing, Cyrielle Manin and Sayanne Guivissa for girls’ racing, and Nohemy Marajo for artistic swimming.
