Kuwait to double tourist arrivals to one million by 2015
According to the latest STR hospitality report, Kuwait outperformed the Middle East and Africa market average in terms of its hotel RevPar performance. Kuwait's occupancy levels grew by 5.3% to 55.1%, average room rate improved from $221 to $227 and RevPar increased to $120, an extremely healthy 19.2% increase year-on-year.
The increases also supported a Euromonitor survey which recorded 554,000 arrivals in Kuwait in 2010 and forecast one million arrivals by 2015. Constant with those figures, Arabian Travel Market (ATM), the leading travel exhibition in the Middle East, has also seen increased interest from Kuwait with the number of pre-registered visitors already up 118% from the same time last year ahead of this year's event.
Kuwait launched a five-year plan for tourism last year which aims to attract more leisure tourists. This is part of the government's plan to develop the country as a commercial and financial centre alongside tourism, said Mark Walsh, Portfolio Director, Reed Travel Exhibitions.