Hotels in Addis Facing about 35 Mn USD Loss Per Month: Owners Association

Addis Ababa, May 14/2020(ENA) Hotels in Addis Ababa have been losing about 35 million USD in a month due to Covid-19 pandemic, Addis Ababa Hotel Owners Association disclosed.

Addis Ababa Hotel Owners Association  President, Benyam Bisrat told ENA that the finding is based on a survey conducted on all member hotels since the occurrence of the pandemic to  perceive the impact of the pandemic on the industry.

Among the 130 member hotels under the association, 88 percent are currently closed partially or fully and 12 percent used as quarantine and other related services. Less than 2 percent rooms of hotels in the city are occupied, it was learned.

“Based on the finding of the survey, hotels lose over 35million USD on average. Because most of them remains closed,” the president said.

According to him, the association is working in  collaboration with the government to urgently address the problem.

The association, Benyam said, is actively participating in the preparation of recovery strategy and impact assessment that has been carried out by Ministry of Culture and Tourism as well as Hotel and Tourism Institute.

Communication Director of Tourism Ethiopia, one of the institutions preparing a Tourism recovery strategy, Fitsum Asfaw said the recovery strategy will be the best solution to cope with the problem and protect the sector from declining continuously.

He revealed that the strategy is finalized and will implemented soon as the problem is very urgent.

Hotel and Tourism Training Institute Deputy Director-General Gezehagn Abate said on his part the institute is helping the industry to be protected from much loss by conducting studies, giving consultancy, and training.

Besides, “we are carrying out a wide survey with owners of hotels, Tourism Ethiopia and tour operators to find out which methodology would be advisable to overcome the crisis. This   survey will provided practical inputs to our recovery strategy,” he stated.

As part of its activities to support the hotel and tourism sector, the government is easing financial burden through debt relief and delay in payments of installments on loan.

Furthermore, the Office of the Prime Minister and National Bank of Ethiopia have declared that they would inject 456 million USD as liquidity for private banks to enable the rescheduling of debt with potential interest holiday and addition loans so that businesses can endure cash flow strains.