After a good couple of years of haggling and bargaining, Ryanair on Tuesday announced that it was set to open a base in Malta and introduce six new routes.

This, of course, is great news. It is good news primarily because it will mean an influx of tourists from previously untapped markets – Bologna, Krakow, Billund and others. It is also good news for the general public – in short – people have a few more holiday (or business) destinations to choose from and at a lower price than most legacy carriers. After all, while there is an anti-Ryanair lobby even in Malta – it is the pocket which ultimately decides.

There is of course a third positive factor, and that is the jobs which will be created as a direct result of Ryanair’s expanded operation.

But the issue goes much deeper. Ryanair is not the only carrier to have increased routes and frequency – we have seen Easyjet, BMI, Norwegian and others set up routes to Malta and all together, we have already seen good results.

Malta, like any other nation, was negatively affected by the Icelandic ash cloud. Flights were cancelled and holidaymakers were stranded here while Maltese persons were stuck abroad. Many tourists could not make their holiday and others cancelled. Notwithstanding all this, figures for March have shown a marked upturn and we are back on track. Low cost carriers believe that they can bring an influx of tourists to Malta, and this is true, but Malta must also do its part. One of the major reasons why airlines ditch routes is seat load. It is useless for an airline to offer 10 new routes if they cannot get people to buy those seats and in turn make a profit.

To this end, Malta must continue its advertising drive and continue to attract people to our islands. A couple of years ago, we identified lack of accessibility as being one of the major reasons why we could not get tourists to come here.

In came Ryanair and Easyjet and we immediately saw a surge in arrivals – this is undeniable. Air Malta had to up its game as a result and has emerged to be more competitive than it was before the arrival of the low-cost carriers.

But, as Parliamentary Secretary Mario de Marco put it yesterday, our challenge is to fill increased seat capacity. He said that the new base at MIA will see seat numbers increase by some 220,000 to 3,168,000 this year. The MTA, he said, will be focusing its efforts on gaining access to foreign countries, marketing and the Maltese product itself. We could not agree more, especially on the last point. While we have mentioned time and time again that we must upgrade our infrastructure, our marketing and our advertising, the proof of the pudding is in the eating. If people come here and find a destination which does not offer them a good value holiday (that could include culture, food, beaches, roads, rude bus drivers and more), they will not go home and encourage others to visit our country.

Much like restaurants, holiday destination references depend mostly on word of mouth. If tourists do not talk about Malta positively, then we can hardly expect to fill those extra seats. Of course, we do not wish to portray doom and gloom. It looks good and our arrivals are increasing once more – but what we must do, above all else, is continue to invest in product Malta. Failure to do so will see us fall by the wayside. There is only one crucial reminder – low-cost carriers can pull out at any time. We should not be overly reliant on them.