Tourist industry to provide 250,000 jobs by 2016

Sri Lanka Tourism is geared to attract high-end spenders from China, India, Turkey and Japan, said Sri Lanka Tourism, Chairman, Bhashwara Senanka Gunarathna at the launch of Hotel Show 2013.

He said that Sri Lanka Tourism has identified strategies to attract 2.5 million visitors by 2016 and added that the industry is confident it could achieve the target. It also hopes to increase industry revenue to $ 2.7 billion and provide 250,000 job opportunities by 2016.

Sri Lanka Tourism is adopting strategies to meet tourism development goals.“We are focused not only on attracting more visitors but also enhancing the quality of tourism products. The Hotel Show and many such mega tourism promotion events will help enhance Sri Lanka tourism and woo more visitors to the country,” he said. Sri Lanka Tourism attracted over one million visitors last year and it hopes to surpass last year's target with more star class hotels being built across the country. Gunarathna said that all those who stayed for over 24 hours were added to the number of arrivals.

Some foreign visitors said that the standard of the Sri Lanka hospitality sector is not up to the mark. But industry personnel at the media briefing said that the service standards of certain one and two star hotels are probably not satisfactory. They said that the hotel sector standards in Sri Lanka are high.

The main feature of this year's hotel show is the Sri Lankan finals of the Bocuse d’ Or competition, a biennial chef championship named after chef Paul Bocuse.The winner of the Sri Lankan edition will participate in the Asian finals followed by the main finale in France. Bocuse d'Or, Sri Lanka Chairman, chef Rohan Fernandopulle said that preparations to host the competition during the hotel show have been finalised.

The hotel show will be held in Colombo from July 26-28.

-LF