Today's Edition
KHALED AL KHAWALDEH (ABU DHABI)
The UAE was the most popular tourist destination in the Global Hotel Alliance portfolio, which consists of over 800 hotels and 27 million members in 100 countries, in the first half of 2024.
The UAE was the most preferred international destination for members, pushing Singapore to second place.
The UAE's top markets for visitors were Italy, the UK and Russia whilst the USA was the biggest feeder market globally.
"The strong performance is due to a 35 percent increase in hotel nights spent by alliance members in the UAE market," noting that the growth indicators in the local market during the first half of the year exceeded the global average," Global Hotel Alliance CEO, Christopher Hartley said.
"These achievements are particularly notable, given that 2023 was already a record year for total hotel room revenues for the loyalty programme."
Global Hotel Alliances loyalty programme achieved revenues of $2.3 billion in 2023, recording 10 million hotel nights.
The total hotel room revenues in the first half of this year reached $1.3 billion, compared to $1.1 billion in the first half of 2023.
The firm recorded all-round strong performances in the first half of 2024, which they said painted an optimistic picture for the global tourism industry.
Room nights booked through their members surged 13.4 percent in Q2, with H1 growth of 17.3 percent compared to 2023.
At the same time, room revenue shot up 10 percent in Q2 versus Q2 2023.
Moreover, total H1 room revenues reached $1.3 billion compared to $1.1 billion in H1 2023, whilst the firms cross brand revenues picked up 31 percent to reach $176 million in H1 2024 versus $135 million in H1 2023.
"Our stellar H1 numbers reflect the huge demand for leisure travel and the strength of our expanding portfolio," Christopher Hartley said.
The UAE's tourism sector has been experiencing sustained growth since the resumption of global traffic.
According to the latest data from the Government of Dubai, the emirate welcomed 10.62M overnight visitors between January and July of 2024, an increase of eight percent compared to the same period last year.
Meanwhile Data from the Ministry of Economy showed that the hotel sector in the UAE achieved strong performance levels in 2023, continuing robust growth into the current year.
The data revealed that hotel revenues in the UAE rose to Dh43.5 billion in 2023, marking a 15 percent growth compared to 2022.
The number of hotel guests in the UAE increased to 28 million in 2023, an 11 percent growth compared to 2022, with a total of 97.3 million hotel nights.
