11:40am Following on neatly from that Q&A session, we now have a panel discussion on healthy competition, with contributions from Michael Martin, General Manager & Regional General Manager, InterContinental Dubai Marina & Intercontinental Hotel Group, David Brown, General Manager, Fraser Suites Dubai, David Thomson, Chief Operating Officer, JA Resorts & Hotels and Amit Arora, CEO Hospitality, SKAI Holdings.
11:35am Questions from the audience now for Almarri, including one on the impact of the Tourism Dirham. He thinks things have moved in a positive way, with no negative impact and all the money collected going into international promotion. Over coming 3-4 months, we should see introduction of digital assets, additional overseas offices, campaigns abroad, focused not just on traditional markets, but also markets with potential. "Are we on people's lists, of one of the five places they want to visit?"
11:25am Almarri is now talking about the hotel classification system, which has recently been overhauled. Hoping new technology will simplify things. He also says that by end of 2015 the DTCM's vocational college should be up and running at a temporary location.
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11:20am Almarri doesn't want room rates to be cheap; doesn't want Dubai to seen as a cheap destination. "I'm quite comfortable with the current situation. Now in the pipeline we have the right number of hotels coming through." He adds that he's happy with balance of room number and visitor growth.
11:15am: We now have Dubai Department of Tourism and Commerce Marketing (DTCM) director general His Excellency Helal Almarri on stage for a Q&A session. He starts of by thanking the industry, He describes support from hoteliers as 'inspiring' over the last 18 months in the Vision 2020 push. He also believes the right visitors are coming to Dubai and spending money in hotels and restaurants. "Diversification is going further and we are getting a lot more visitors from Africa and the Far East," he adds.
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