Above: the NH El Rancho in Petion-Ville
By the Caribbean Journal staff
Haiti is hoping to see the construction of 3,000 new hotel rooms by the year 2017, the country’s Tourism Ministry said this week.
The announcement came after Haiti had completed a hotel classification programme that surveyed around 4,150 hotel rooms in the country.
The “Hibiscus” programme, named after Haiti’s national flower, was launched in April 2013, seeking to replace the traditional “star” system grading hotel quality.
Haiti has seen the opening of three major hotels in the last year, including the Royal Oasis, the Best Western Premier and the NH El Rancho, all of which are located in the Petion-Ville suburb of Port-au-Prince.
The next major project set to come on line is the Digicel-backed Marriott hotel project, which will have 175 rooms.
The hotel push is part of a renewed drive to promote Haiti’s tourism sector.
While recent data has not yet been released, the boost had worked early this year, with a 20.2 percent increase in stop-over arrivals in the first quarter of 2013, for a total of 99,637 visitors.