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EDITOR IN CHIEF- ABDULLAH BIN SALIM AL SHUEILI

Over 5,000 hotel rooms on anvil

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MUSCAT, MAY 26 - Around 5,000 hotel rooms will be added to the Oman’s hospitality sector by 2020 to meet the increasing number of inbound visitors, a senior government official said.


The Sultanate attracted over three million tourists in 2019, an increase of seven per cent from the previous year.


According to Salem bin Oday al Maamari, Director-General of Promotion at the Ministry of Tourism, the growth in the number of tourists to Oman will continue to not less than seven per cent.


According to him, the contribution of the tourism sector to the national economy has been $1.6 billion. The government will focus on tapping new markets like Russia, China, Spain, the US and even South-East Asia, he said. It was noted that providing direct flight connectivity to some of these potential market is key to the growth of the tourism sector.


Total revenue in the three-to-five-star category rose by 10.4 per cent to RO 71.3 million till the end of March 2019 compared to RO 64.6 million for the same period of the previous year, according to NCSI


Meanwhile, the total number of guests showed an increase by 11.3 per cent in the three-month period of 2019, reaching 483,995 from 435,033 guests for the same period of 2018.


Europeans constituted the maximum number of visitors, reaching 214,457, followed by 118,220 Omanis, 54,266 Asians till the end of March 2019 period.


There was a rise in the number of American guests, other Arab guests and African guests by 2.3 per cent, 9.9 per cent and 0.4 per cent to reach 17,460; 18,709; and 3,170 African guests, respectively.


However, there was a drop in the number of GCC and Oceania guests by 13.5 per cent and 4.2 per cent to reach 39,547 and 4,685 guests, respectively. Omani hotels received 1.49 million guests and the hotels generated revenues of RO 214.1 million in 2018.


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