Tourist lobby raises alarm: ‘Is Malta delivering on its promises?’

Government should address a number of issues impacting the tourism industry, or else risk the country’s reputation as a holidaying destination, the hotels lobby has said.

The Malta Hotels and Restaurants Association (MHRA) questioned whether despite government’s investment, and a record number of tourists coming to the country, visitors are satisfied with their trip.

“The question, one now needs to pose is whether these tourists whom we have all managed to attract are satisfied with what they have experienced in Malta. Is Malta delivering on its promises? Perhaps on some but definitely not all,” it said.

The MHRA identified a number of areas which government’s needs to address in order to bolster the country’s tourism product.

“Let’s take cleaning and upkeep of our surroundings, this leaves much to be desired,” it said. Malta has become very shabby and dirty, and this is unacceptable if we are aiming to remain a destination of choice. Cleaning, upkeep, and enforcement must be carried out especially across all the streets of our tourism zones and beaches, and not only designated areas. Better protection of our sea must be taken up as maritime activity is increases dramatically during the summer period. Malta needs more investment, better management, serious enforcement, and immediate action before it becomes too late.”

The second area of concern is the activity related to road infrastructure by the public sector and the construction projects “which together are turning Malta into a permanent construction site experience, creating gross inconveniences for both locals and tourists alike.”

READ ALSO | Small businesses reel from power outages: customer losses and financial strains

“Malta has reached a stage where no locality or street is spared from any construction activity causing noise, dust, and aesthetic pollution. No proper central coordination and management of such activity is in place leading to chaos and long queues of traffic everywhere, all the time. We need to take the bull by the horns as the situation in our streets is in a dire state and will do nothing but put off tourists and their families and friends from ever considering coming back again to our islands,” the MHRA said.

The association also made reference to the energy sector, stating despite uncommon temperatures sweeping the country over the past week, MHRA members have suffered not only financial losses in the form of lost food stock, guests cancelling bookings, damages to equipment which run into thousands of euros but more importantly suffered from reputational damage.

“Many tourists who found themselves in hotels without electricity have turned to social media complaining that their vacation was ruined with some also giving low scoring reviews to hotels on booking platforms. The same applies to restaurants affected by power cuts whose patrons were disappointed. These restaurants lost precious peak season opportunities as they were not able to function without electric energy,” it said.

The issues listed by the MHRA have resulted in serious negative impact on the current and future business of hotels and restaurants, it said.

“The industry recognizes that the temperature spikes in the past days were higher than the average levels however the number of faults and outages seriously affected the industry. Government must ensure action as such events will no longer be considered extraordinary but will be the norm,” it said.

It called for proactive action to ensure the situation is not repeated again, saying damages were “enormous”.

“Without timely decisions and actions, we will end up in a situation where the damage caused to the image and identity of destination Malta becomes irreparable,” it said.