At a compound annual growth rate of 6.93 per cent, the revenue jump reflects the region’s steadily improving business prospects as well as leisure tourist demand, Kuwait Financial Centre, or Markaz, said in its GCC Hospitality report.
The average occupancy rate for GCC, which was 68 per cent for the year 2012, is expected to reach an average occupancy of 73 per cent by 2016, said the report.
“The GCC is home to high percentage of luxury hotels and its pipeline is also dominated by many high profile projects,” it said.
STR Global in its Construction Pipeline Report for June 2013 said that the Middle East/Africa hotel development pipeline comprises of 491 hotels totalling 120,795 rooms.
Dubai, region’s key market reported the largest number of rooms under construction with 10,391 rooms. Five other markets reported more than 1,000 rooms under construction: Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (5,598 rooms); Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates (3,727 rooms); Jeddah, Saudi Arabia (2,213 rooms); Cairo, Egypt (1,744 rooms); and Amman, Jordan (1,547 rooms).
Markaz report said the Average Daily Rent (ADR) for the year 2012 is estimated at $ 204, which is relatively on the higher side in comparison with other regions. “While issues like political unrest and oversupply affected the OR and ADR in the past, the forecast for both these metrics is positive with increasing business as well as leisure tourist demand.”
The report argued that although there were several growth factors driving the hospitality industry in the GCC, international tourism has to be the most significant one.
“The GCC region is home to some of the finest hotels in the world and people visit the region for niche tourism offerings such as cultural, religious tourism as well as sports and event based tourism. The region is increasingly seen as a Mice destination.
