MADRID, Spain. – Between 2014 and 2020, five-star hotel guest rooms rose from 37.3% to 46.9% of the total hotel guestrooms in Cuba, according to statistics shared by Cuban economist Pedro Monreal.
In six years, approximately 12,500 luxury guest rooms were built, in spite of a decrease in the number of guests arriving in the island since before the COVID-19 pandemic, explained Monreal through his Twitter account.
However, and according to this specialist’s report, between 2014 and 2018, The per-tourist income in the Cuban economy (9.3%) was much lower than the rise in the number of visitors (56.4%), which indicates that the quality of tourism that visits the island, as far as purchasing power is concerned, has also decreased.
“The delay in correcting the sector’s deformed structure regarding domestic investment is one of the main insufficiencies in Cuba’s economic policy. It poses a problem to continue assuming that the present pattern of investment is compatible with the process of development,” added the economist.
At the start of this week, the Cuban government presented tourism projects to Spanish hotel businessmen, among them one about increasing hotel capacity to 95,000 guest rooms, and generate more than 6,000 visitors by 2030.
Juan Carlos García Granda, Cuba’s minister of Tourism, encouraged European entrepreneurs to invest in Cuba. “In spite of the campaigns that distort our reality, I invite all of you to visit us and corroborate it yourselves. We are a safe country, we are vaccinated, and friendly, with lots to offer along the lines of health tourism, nature tourism, patrimonial and cultural tourism, and beaches.”
The increase of hotel constructions, which did not stop even during the pandemic, stands in sharp contrast with the housing problems that the Cuban people have historically endured, as well as the lesser capital earmarked for other sectors, like Health and Agriculture.
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