Cuba´s Hotel Industry is Getting Hotter Than Ever Before

During a recent working session with French tour operators, Carmen Casals, chief of Cuba´s Tourism Ministry Office in France, explained the island nation´s hotel industry in grew at an unprecedented 9 percent index between 1990 and 2004.

Cuba´s travel industry will count on four new hotels by the end of 2005, ramping up the island nation´s stock of accommodations to a grand total of 44,000 rooms across the country.

At the same time, Cuba climbed last year to the runner-up spot in Latin America in the category of event and incentive destination, while Havana topped the list of the region´s best burgs for congress and conventions.

Cuba´s leisure sector is hoping to nab 2.3 million foreign visitors in 2005, thus underscoring the country´s upturn trend that has marked its tourism development in recent years.

Spanish hotel chain Sol Meliá, for instance, has just announced the grand opening of its 22nd establishment in Cuba, scheduled for early 2006. The Meliá-Las Dunas will strengthen the Majorca-based company´s stance as the number-one foreign hotelier on the island nation.

Gaviota S.A. owns 8,547 rooms in Cuba and runs 35 percent of those accommodations. For the rest of the year, the Cuban company is planning to open the Royal Hideaway Cayo Ensenachos Hotel on the northern keys off the central province of Villa Clara.

Cuban travel and tour company Gaviota S.A. has just opened Montehabana, an apart-hotel designed to target long-staying guests and conventional tourists as well. Montehabana has 88 well-equipped apartments and one of the exclusive reserved for handicapped people.