AMMAN — Hotel
occupancy rates in Amman, Aqaba, and the
Dead Sea exceeded 70 percent over the
weekend, according to the latest Jordan Hotel Association data, amid
expectations from tourism experts that the sector will continue to recover in
view of the stability of the epidemiological situation around the world.
اضافة اعلان
Occupancy rates at Amman hotels during the weekend
reached 71 percent, at Dead Sea hotels 77 percent, while Petra hotels had a 39
percent occupancy rate, said the head of the association, Abdul Hakim Al-Hindi.
Hindi added that occupancy rates at Aqaba beach
hotels ranged between 75 percent and 85 percent, “while occupancy rates in the
city’s hotels reached about 75 percent”.
He pointed out that occupancy rates in hotels “are
increasing” and, “I expect occupancy rates at hotels in the city of Petra to
record high figures starting with October.”
Hindi emphasized that “celebrations, festivals and
events that took place in various governorates have positively affected the
high occupancy rates at hotels and restaurants, in addition to the hard work of
the Ministry of Tourism, the Jordan Tourism Board and all tourist
associations”.
Chief Commissioner at
Petra Development & Tourism Regional Authority Suleiman Al-Farajat told
Jordan News that for
a long time, the city of Petra used to witness an increase in tourists in the
months of April and October; now “it is expected that the tourist movement will
intensify from the beginning of September until the end of November”.
He added that although the city has begun to witness
increased tourist activity after the great losses witnessed through the COVID-19
pandemic, “the hotels are still trying to compensate for the losses they
incurred over the past period and have not started to make profit yet”.
He stressed that it is important for hotels not to
raise their prices and for employees to be highly qualified and trained,
“especially since during the COVID-19 pandemic hotels lost some of their cadres
and are looking for employees to train and qualify them”.
Chairman of the Board of Directors of the Dead Sea
Hotels Company Michael Nazzal told
Jordan News that “there are different
sites that contain tourist hotels, and each site has different data from the
other”.
“Amman, for example, has high occupancy rates
throughout the week due to the presence of Gulf tourists,” he elaborated.
“It can be said that the conditions at the Dead Sea
and in Aqaba were better last year due to travel restrictions in many foreign
countries, which increased citizens’ demand for domestic tourism,” he added.
Nazzal pointed out that “at the beginning of
September, domestic tourism will end, especially with the return to school, but
foreign tourism will begin, which usually continues until the end of November”.
The head of Jordan Tour Guides Association, Hani
Al-Masadah, told
Jordan News that “the tourism sector, in general, is
constantly improving. This is a normal situation when you get out of a certain
epidemiological situation or start coexisting with it, and this is what is
happening with us now”.
He urged, however, the concerned authorities to
establish more hotels in order to attract more tourists, “especially since
there are about 33,000 hotel rooms in Jordan only and we need more”.
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