The view from Le Meridien Pyramids Resort & Spa [image for illustrative purposes only] The view from Le Meridien Pyramids Resort & Spa [image for illustrative purposes only]

The recovery story for tourism and hotels in Egypt continued into January, with strong growth across all the key performance indicators, according to the latest data from STR Global.

Occupancy levels at the country’s hotels hit 49.9% during the month, up 19% year-on-year; average daily rate rose 39% to EGP604.53 (US $79.25) while RevPAR increased by 65.4% to EGP301.88 (US $39.58).

The Egyptian performance was in stark contrast to that of the Dubai, where occupancy was down 2.7% to 80.4%, ADR declined by 2.7% to AED887.59 (US $241.66), and RevPAR fell 5.3% to AED713.99 (US $194.39).

STR Global pointed out that the declines were largely due to an “exceptionally strong” comparable to January 2014, when the emirate had its strongest January performance for 10 years.

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“Despite continuous strong supply growth for Dubai (+6.8%), occupancy levels managed to stay above 85% for January 2015; however, that was three points lower than January 2014,” added STR Global managing director Elizabeth Winkle.

“Demand (+3.7%) continued to grow in Dubai, and with the exception of the months of Ramadan, demand growth for the emirate has been positive in every month for the past five years.”

Across the entire Middle East, occupancy fell 0.7 percentage points to 72.4%, ADR was down 0.9% to US $222.74 and RevPAR declined by 1.8% to US $161.33.

Strong occupancy performances in the region were delivered by Beirut (+34.9% to 47.1%) and Doha (+11.8% to 83.2%). Doha also delivered the strongest ADR increase, up 11.4% to US $207.25. Beirut followed with a 9.6% increase to US $166.57.

In Saudi Arabia, although occupancy fell by 1.5% to 69.2%, ADR rose 3.5% to SAR727.86 (US $194.08) and RevPAR jumped 1.9% to SAR503.59 (US $134.28).