ISLAMABAD: The government should address key issues of the hotel industry to facilitate its growth to enable it to create more jobs.

This was stated by Islamabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ICCI) President Ahsan Zafar Bakhtawari during the visit of Senior Vice Chairman of Pakistan Hotels Association Mian Akram Farid to the chamber’s office on Saturday. Mr Bakhtawari said the hotel industry was an important source of revenue for the country, besides five to six million people were associated with the hotel industry.

He said that since 1990s, no new big hotel chain had come to Pakistan due to lack of national tourism policy and a consistent policy framework from the government for the hotel industry.

The ICCI president said the government could generate more revenue by creating a favourable environment for this industry and solving its major issues.

Mian Akram Farid said the government should abolish regulatory duty on the import of machinery and other items for the hotel industry as these duties had increased the cost of doing business manifold.

He said according to the current market rate, land prices have increased many times while imposition of various taxes and levies on the hotel industry had created further problems.

He said bulk of the capital was spent on the purchase of land for hotels and stressed that the land should be provided to this industry at government rates.

He further said 22pc enhanced interest rate should also be reduced, adding that high electricity and gas tariffs had also greatly increased the cost of doing business for this industry and emphasised that these high utility tariffs should be rationalised.

ICCI Senior Vice President Faad Waheed urged that immediate action should be taken against the illegal guesthouses running in the federal capital.

He said earlier the CDA had closed guest houses set up in residential areas, but these guest houses had cropped up once again in the residential sectors.

Apart from this, residential apartments are also being used as guest houses and they are not paying taxes, he claimed. ICCI Vice President Engr Azharul Islam Zafar said the hotel industry was not given any relief in the last budget.

He said due to credit sales, hotel owners were paying sales tax and bed tax, demanding that the government should immediately abolish bed tax at the federal and provincial levels so that the industry could survive.

He said the government should consider reducing the federal and provincial sales tax on hotels to 10pc to reduce its problems.

Published in Dawn, August 20th, 2023