International Hotel and Restaurant Association Congress opened in Belgrade

- The annual International Hotel and Restaurant Association Congress started today (January 18, 2010) in hotel Continental in Belgrade. The IH&RA Congress will be closed on January 21st - Beoinfo announced.

The world's biggest meeting of hotel and restaurant managers will gather 250 participants from 42 countries of Europe and the world. The theme of the Congress is "New Trends in Hotel Business and Balkan as New Tourist Market of Europe". The patrons are the Ministry of Economy and Regional Development, as well as tourism organizations of Serbia and Belgrade.

– Because of the global crisis, all European countries registered 3-7% smaller incomes from tourism in 2009, while our tourism incomes grew by 1%. At the same time, the number of overnight stays was increased by 6%. However, total income from tourism amounted to only 900m USD, which is much less than the similar countries registered last year. In order to achieve better results, we must constantly invest in facilities and, what is even more important, we must raise the level of quality of services. When the quality of service is good, the prices is always in the background - said Mlađan Dinkić, the Minister of Economy and Regional Development.

Dinkić reminded that VAT for hotels and restaurants in Serbia amounted to 8% and announced the series of stimulus measures for revival of our hotel and tourist offer. The Government will provide favorable loans through business banks, and certain funds will also be set aside for training of our hotel managers abroad.

The President of the International Hotel & Restaurant Association, Gasan Aidi, advised all the present hotel managers to keep investing in hotels at the time of the crisis, as well as to take care of the guests and their staff.

– In spite of the crisis, people will not stop travelling. Use the potential of the Chinese market with 50m new tourists, offer some additional free services such as wireless Internet or discount in case of bigger number of overnight stays. Don't lay off your employees and reward those most loyal ones. Ask your governments to provide some additional benefits such as reduced tax rates and cheaper loans. Meet your country and learn how to present its tourist potentials in the best light possible – said Aidi.

The CEO of the Tourism Organization of Belgrade, Jasna Dimitrijević, said that there were about 40 hotels of different categories in our capital city, as well as that some new facility with three or four stars was opened every year.

– If you want, for example, to organize a big congress in Belgrade, you can count on about 5,000 rooms that meet all standards. There were about 1,100,000 overnight stays in Belgrade's hotels last year, which is 16% more than one year before. We had 4% more foreigners in 2009 than in 2008, but the number of domestic guests dropped. Total accommodation capacity in Belgrade's hotels, hostels, camps and private lodging is about 12,000 beds – Jasna Dimitrijević explained.

The International Hotel & Restaurant Association gathers over 100 national associations, 300,000 hotels and over 8m restaurants.