Hospitality Industry Standards in Georgia
“We should be focused on Asia, especially on the Chinese tourism market, because all other markets are gradually narrowing. The statistics proves that Chinese tourists are the highest-spending tourists, anywhere in the world”, Paata Kokaia, founder of the InnGroup network of hotels, told Business Partner.
Today, Kutaisi is one of these prospective destinations for developing hotel infrastructure, from which tourists are able to leave for any direction or destination. Unlike previous years, the flow of tourists is declining, and this trend has affected the hotel business too, Kokaia said.
“Several years ago, our business was looking at dramatic growth. The number of tourists considerably exceeded the number of suites we could build. Regretfully, this situation has changed now”, Kokaia noted.
Almost all tourism markets are shrinking, bit by bit. Therefore, the time has come to shift attention to Asia, especially the Chinese market, because China is a major potential tourism market, and Chinese tourists are the highest-spending tourists, he said.
Even the Arab market has changed. Many of them are not let across the border. There were cases when serious businesspeople were not let into the country. It is wonderful that charter flights will open to Thailand, however, China is the biggest market. :Last year’s statistics show that Chinese tourists have spent about 300 billion USD worldwide. This means that Chinese tourists spend much more money than all tourists from the 9 other countries in the rating”, Kokaia pointed out.
Charter flights should be developed to make use of the Chinese market, the visibility of the country should grow, and visa procedures should be simplified, he added.
“We should satisfy several conditions make better use of the Chinese market’s opportunities. First, we should prepare commercials about Georgia, the visibility of our country should increase, the Georgian Embassy should be engaged in the process, and visa-issuing procedures should be eased.
We have partners in China, and one of them planned to spend his 10-day vacation in Georgia, but he managed to stay here only 2 days, because his vacation time was done by the time he got the visa”, Kokaia noted.
As explained by InnGroup’s founder, certain preventive mechanisms should also introduced, so tourists from China don’t stay in the country illegally.
“Some of these tourists may decide to stay in the country illegally, but I have proposed an idea through which travel companies delivering tourists should submit a guaranteed amount of 200,000 USD and a certain portion will be deducted for each tourist illegally staying in the country. These funds will be spent on finding illegal migrants, and deporting them. This means certain mechanism should exist so that travel companies that don’t deliver everyone will show more caution”, Kokaia said.