In addition, travel within the region should be made more affordable if the intra-Caribbean travel market is to survive.
These were two of a number of points made by president of the Caribbean Hotel Association (CHA), Peter Odle, as he spoke at the opening ceremony of the Caribbean Hotel Tourism Conference here on Sunday.
"There must be a concerted effort to do whatever it takes to enable our own people to move easily within the Caribbean without the existing weighty restrictions.
"How else are we going to make a reality of the so-called single space and facilitate the free movement of labour?" he asked.
He told hundreds of delegates at the Hyatt Regency Hotel that the region must continue to overcome the insular and inward-looking practices that prevented its people from working together to solidify their efforts to market themselves as one tourism destination.
Odle raised as a case in point the recent alleged terrorist plot linking Trinidad and Guyana nationals accused of planning to blow up the JFK Airport in New York.
"Already the international media reports are talking about the Caribbean as a whole, not just the two countries named. This has always been our problem.
"We are the ones who think of ourselves as mostly independent individual countries, but the rest of the world does not. Their perception is very different and it is the only one that matters."
He added: "We need to accept that we are seen as a common region and market ourselves as such while depicting a mosaic of diverse cultures and cuisines. Fragmentation will not cut it."
Odle said such an approach must become part of current and historic efforts to unify the region.
The CHA president also pointed out that intra-regional travel was a significant market, and ways must be made to maximise this potential by offering cheaper airfares.
"Present airfares will keep Caribbean vacation travellers at home and will deter island hopping by foreign visitors who might have wanted to visit a neighbouring island during their holiday."
The Barbadian hotelier also noted the importance of addressing the "mountain of taxes embedded in air travel", which he said should be reduced or removed.