Sixty-six new hotels to woo 2.5 m tourists by 2016

by Jayampathy JAYASINGHE

With the sharp increase in the number of tourist arrivals in the country following the end of terrorism revenue has increased tremendously, said Sri Lal Mithapala, a well-known environmentalist and Immediate Past President of the Tourist Hotel Association of Sri Lanka.

He was addressing the Women's Chamber of Commerce recently.

He said 850,000 tourists visited the country during the past three years and the target of one million tourist arrivals will be realised sooner than later. "Not only have tourist arrivals grown but we have also earned nearly US Dollars 850 million as a result. This was an important aspect of tourism which has a direct impact on the rural population of Sri Lanka." He said approval has been granted to build 66 hotel projects to attract 2.5 million tourists by 2016.

"We need 45,000 rooms to achieve this target which will bring around two billion US Dollars." He said tourism is the buzzword today and everyone was earning money. All hotels in the country are raking huge profits. Each five star hotel in Colombo makes a net profit of Rs. 1 million annually. "We are earning a great deal of money unlike earlier. Tourism has also provided indirect employment for Batik sellers and wood carvers," he said.