Government has no intention of capping number of hotels - Clayton Bartolo

The government has no intention of capping the number of hotels in the country, as the sector is continuously moving forward and flourishing, Tourism Minister Clayton Bartolo told The Malta Independent.

Last September, a study by the Malta Hotels and Restaurants Association showed that Malta will need to bring in 4.7 million tourists to cater for the planned increase in hotels. This is almost double the 2.8 million tourists Malta received before the Covid19 pandemic.

The study reviewed Planning Authority permits for hotel bed stock which have not yet been approved. It found that Malta would need 4.7 million tourists, staying an average of just under 7 nights to cover 80% of their occupancy.

Asked about the matter a few months ago, the minister said that Malta definitely cannot take five million tourists, and the government will not be going in the direction of aiming to attract that number of tourists to the country.

Told last week that the PA has still issued more permits for new hotels in spite of his concerns about the sustainability of the sector if more hotels continue to be built, he said: “This is an industry where the more time passes, the more we are seeing tourists of a higher quality (come to Malta) when compared to previous years. As such, we continue to see investment that brings more quality in the tourism product, not least from the hotel aspect.”

The government, he continued, has no plans on implementing a numerus clausus or of introducing some form of capping, “as the market continues moving forward and flourishing, and at the same time we want to see higher quality investment so that tourists who come to Malta will have a higher quality tourism product than we had before.”

Pressed on the study, and asked how exactly this will be sustainable, the minister said that one needs to look at things in more detail and not just stop at the five million tourist point, “because everything needs to be studied in detail before making any such statement.”

In reference to the results of the studies, Chamber of Commerce President Marisa Xuereb had previously asked why permits continue to be granted even though Malta does not have the capacity to cater for more. Instead, Xuereb said that the country must focus more on improving Malta’s current tourism infrastructure.