Regular flights to Miami could become a reality following the announcement that Latin American insurers are to come to Bermuda for their main conference next year.

More than 400 delegates and their wives plus support staff will jet into Bermuda from right across Latin America and Europe for the Asociacion Latinoamericana de Administradores de Reisgos y Seguros (ALARYS).

And organisers are pushing for Government backing to lobby American Airlines for a regular flight to Miami, which can link Bermuda with South America.

"Miami is like the new centre of Latin America," said Jorge Luzzi, president of ALARYS. "From there you can fly anywhere. It is easier to get from Venezuela to say Peru sometimes by flying via Miami."

And he said it was "absolutely vital" that the Miami flight was brought in to connect Bermuda with Latin America for the region to become a genuine business avenue for the Island.

Eduardo Fox, manager of company and trusts and financial structures at Appleby Spurling and Kempe, who has been instrumental in brining the conference to Bermuda, said that there was easily enough interest to support a flight to and from Miami out of Bermuda.

Yesterday Minister of Finance Eugene Cox announced that the ALARYS event, which is expected to bring in millions of dollars worth of business when it holds its sixth biennial conference here in 2004, was heading to Bermuda.

The event will bring in about 400 delegates from Latin America and Europe, plus their families, and is expected to open up a whole new region of development for Bermuda's businesses.

And the Island could get a further boost if the deal to get an affiliated conference, the International Federation of Risk and Insurance Management Associations (IFRIMA) is signed next month - which could bring the total number of delegates up to 1,000 insurance professionals.

And as a result Bermuda could get a flight to Miami - which would open up the south of the United States and give easier access to South America.

"There is already a great deal of business that goes on between Latin America and Bermuda," said Mr. Fox. "And this amount of business is expected to continue to grow. The number of non-insurance incorporations has actually fallen since 2000, and this is a way to get numbers up again."

Mr. Fox went on to add that Bermuda is heavily dependent on the United States and Europe, and a downturn on these markets could hit the Island hard - and looking at South America was a way of diversifying Bermuda's business base.

"There is a very large market out there and we are ready and willing to tap into it," said Mr. Fox. "For the past ten years we have been working on bringing Latin America to Bermuda, and we have had some real success."

Mr. Luzzi pointed out that most of the large companies in almost all of the region had set up companies in Bermuda already, but there was scope for more business to come to Bermuda's shores. And he said that a Bermuda delegation had been going to ALARYS conferences for the past ten years drumming up a steady stream of business.

Mr. Luzzi added that a flight to and from Miami would open this business avenue up even further as it was much easier (and cheaper) to travel south from Miami than from New York.

"In Latin America we like to meet face to face, to do business with actual people," he said. "And at the moment it is quite difficult to get to Bermuda. You have to fly to New York and then Bermuda and it can be difficult. A flight would be a great help to relations."

Mr. Fox revealed that when David Allen was Tourism Minister, Bermuda came very close to having a regular flight to Miami. But the then minister became ill and this combined with unfavourable economic climates in parts of Latin America had led to the idea being dropped and the idea died with Mr. Allen.

But now there is new hope, and the new band of lobbyists hope to convince American Airlines that the route would be a profitable one for the airline.

"We would like to develop this relationship, not only with risk managers and the captive market, but also in other sectors of international business," said Mr. Fox.