City hotels gear up for World Economic Forum

Hotel operators have less than a month to make final preparations for the African Edition of the World Economic Forum slated to take place 11-13 May. About 1500 delegates as well as their accompanying delegations are expected to be in Kigali for the high-level meet. According to the Rwanda Development Board, guests will begin arriving about 10 days to the event with possibilities of staying days after the Forum. RDB chief executive officer, Francis Gatare said the expected guests had high spending potential noting that a characteristic of firms invited to take part in the summit is high revenues stream. “These are firms and individuals who have no constraints to pay for services. It is however important to put in place incentives to ensure they spend more,” Gatare said. Currently a majority of city hotels have been booked to capacity for the forum. The operators have been tipped to offer additional services such as entertainment events to make the delegates comfortable. RDB also called on the hotels to make sure that their services are top notch, providing excellent customer care to their guests and making sure the staff are equipped and skilled to attend to the needs of the guests. A waiter attends to a client. (File) The hoteliers were also reminded to constantly maintain high hygiene standards and guarantee security of their guests. Bart Gasana, the chairperson of the Rwanda Tourism Chamber said that the Chamber was working closely with the regulator to address any emerging challenges that may affect service delivery. Belise Kariza, the Chief Tourism Officer at RDB said an assessment and evaluation exercise is underway that will result in the ranking of the hotels by ‘star accreditation’. The exercise is set to be complete by end of May. The rankings and categorisation makes it easy for clients to select from a range of establishments as they give an overview of the quality of facilities and services to expect.editorial@newtimes.co.rw

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City hotels gear up for World Economic Forum