MSC Cruises North America Chairman, Rick Sasso recently delivered an address at the 2026 Grand Bahama Business Outlook event.
Sasso spoke about the development of MSC assets in The Bahamas on Ocean Cay and Grand Bahama. He said, “this island, the infrastructure, it has the talent and the legacy of being a maritime gold mine and it’s always gonna be like that. The redevelopment of Freeport Harbour and the expansion of Ocean Cay and the marine reserve represented the most significant private sector employment and participant initiatives underway in this country. Together these projects amount to nearly one billion dollars of investment, just those projects, and we expect to generate more than one thousand jobs while driving sustainable economic activity nationwide.”
The MSC Chairman also spoke about the impact the redevelopment of Freeport Harbour will have on the economy of Grand Bahama. Sasso said, “10.5 million visits last year, one billion in total economic impact and 14,000 jobs and those are thousands of small businesses that also are connected to all of that. The project here for the Freeport cruise terminals and this project has been on our radar. Why hasn’t it been done before? How can we make this thing really accelerate and become a reality? So this project is in the heart of the expansion for Grand Bahama, for sure. There are a lot of things going on but it will create jobs. It will create meaningful jobs that will connect a lot of other expansion that goes on with cruise tourism. When you see a facility that will eventually have an ability to birth six cruise ships in a day.”
Sasso also emphasized that partnership, prosperity and long term commitment guides the company’s strategies.
