EGYPT: Individuals And Families Boost Hotel Occupancy In Hurghada, Sharm El Sheikh

Egypt's promotional campaigns abroad remain unsatisfactory, fail to bring significant numbers of tourists from Arab world or other countries.

For hotels and tourist facilities in Sharm El-Sheikh and Hurghada, Eid Al-Fitr will bring celebrations and a 60% increase in bookings.

Nagy Erian, former vice head of the Egyptian Hotel Association (EHA), said that there is a 60% increase in bookings in cities, which coincides with the Eid Al-Fitr celebrations.

He explained that the increase only takes place during the week of Eid and goes back to declining to normal levels, so they race to offer services that attract guests, such as concerts and shows.

He revealed that the increase in prices start at 30% as a result of the Egyptian pound’s flotation.

Kamel Abo Ali, chairperson of a group of Sharm El-Sheikh and Hurghada hotels, said that there is a great recovery in the bookings of hotels during Eid.

He pointed out that 30% of Hurghada and Sharm El-Sheikh visitors are Arabs, while domestic tourism represents 70%.

A number of hotels and tourist facilities in the two cities have been developed in the last period and will be reopened in Eid Al-Fitr to attract the largest number of customers.

He stressed that Egypt’s promotional campaigns abroad are still unsatisfactory and could not bring the targeted numbers of visitors, whether from the Arab world or other countries.

He asked to delay any support programmes of domestic tourism until the end of the year, as citizens travel during the summer months to various tourist areas, especially resort cities.

Ahmed Balbaa, chairperson of Balbaa Group for Hotels, said he has reopened a number of hotels to benefit from the time of holidays and the expected tourist flow coming from abroad.

He pointed out that the high occupancy rates will not exceed the Eid Al-Fitr week, where all Egyptians will return to work again and all the occupancy rates will decline again.

He explained that prices should increase because of the increase in input prices after the flotation of the Egyptian pound, which caused prices to increase by 100%.

He stressed that there are a number of demands to revive the tourism movement, mainly allocating the management of airports in tourist cities to specialised international companies and exempting the sector from financial commitments for two years.

Balbaa demanded to drop any legal actions against the sector regarding its dues in order to give hotels and tourist facilities the chance to train new staff and pay salaries from the Emergency and Crisis Fund for a year and then announcing it to reassure the employees.

The hotel booking agent at Viking Sharm El-Sheikh said that there is a boom in booking rate during the Eid Al-Fitr holiday, up to 70% by Egyptians, Arabs, and foreigners.

He pointed out that room prices reached EGP 3,000 because of the flotation.