Hoteliers and experts representing Cuba as a destination discussed the challenges and opportunities for developing and financing hotels once the embargo on travel from the U.S. to Cuba is lifted.
Even without a lot of tourists from the United States, Cuba is the No. 2 travel destination in the Caribbean. Now, with efforts underway to loosen restrictions on U.S. travel to Cuba, hoteliers and investors from the U.S. are planning their moves into the country.
Experts representing Cuba as a destination talked with hoteliers about the challenges and opportunities for developing and operating hotels in the country during the “Cuba: Development and investment opportunities” panel at The Lodging Conference.
The Opportunities
Cuba is already thriving when it comes to annual inbound tourists, and that number is expected to increase dramatically once restrictions are lifted on tourism from the U.S., said James Williams, president of Engage Cuba. Currently, U.S. citizens are allowed to travel to Cuba for 12 purposes, which include education, official U.S. government business and journalism.
“You have an eased travel dynamic, but tourism is still prohibited. Even with that, Cuba was the No. 2 tourism destination, or international traveler destination, in the Caribbean last year,” Williams said. “We’re expecting action this year in the lame duck session … on the U.S. travel ban, so you’re talking about estimates of (one and a half) to three to four million Americans additionally going to Cuba.”
Williams added that “the Cuban hotel capacity is already stretched pretty much to the breaking point, so they’re rapidly trying to build and grow hotels.”
“Huge, pent-up demand” for U.S. travelers in Cuba and a changing travel dynamic overall will make it easier to build and manage hotels there, Williams said. Ruben Ramos Arrieta, minister counselor of the economic and trade office at the Embassy of Cuba, agreed there are a lot of opportunities in the country. “I can tell you that the hospitality sector there in Cuba (was the first) to be open to foreign investment in the ’80s,” he said. “So we’ve had foreign counterparts in the hospitality sector for more than 25 years. Nowadays, Cuba … (is) transforming, and there is change in the economic activity.”
The Challenges
With opportunity comes risk, Strategic Hospitality Services President David Oliver said. Because the citizens of Cuba are “100% literate,” he said, hotel employees from the country working in the country are going to expect good wages and a better quality of life.
“The Cubans know what they have,” he said. “They have a jewel that needs to be buffed a little, but they know what they have and they’re not going to give it away, so you can’t assume there’s going to be money laying around everywhere on the table to be picked up easily.”
Panelists said people who live in Cuba are using old pesos while tourists are using new pesos. Williams said eventually there will be a harmonization of the two currencies, but this will bring challenges because people are unsure of when the change will happen and what the impact of it will be. Williams pointed to other key risks, on both the U.S. and Cuban side of business.
“One piece of risk that is very unique to Cuba is you have an evolving legal framework and regulatory framework on both sides of both players involved in any sort of transaction,” he said. “You have the U.S. legal regime, which is easing at a pace that is significant, but is still a moving target. … We’re expecting imminently another regulatory round of easing from the … the Obama administration, which will make it even easier for hotels and U.S. businesses to operate in Cuba, but we have an election coming up … that will create further uncertainty.” He said Cuba has “gone through some major and really important economic reforms.”
“They’ve put out sort of a modern foreign investment law. They create a lot of incentives. They’ve been much more aggressive and open to attracting foreign investment, but it’s still a moving target as they’re going through their own process of reform improvement or updating in Cuban parts,” he said. “So you do have these issues of, you’re going to be analyzing a situation, which may not be the exact same six months from now as it is today or two years from now or three years from now. That creates challenges.”
But Arrieta said the risks of investment and hotel development in Cuba are minimal. “You have, at this moment, in Cuba 65,000, almost 66,000 rooms,” he said. “And around 45,000 of them are being managed by foreign companies, by joint ventures. … That means that more than 75% of the rooms there in Cuba are doing business with foreign counterparts.”
【译文】
自美国对古巴的通行禁令解除以来，以古巴方面为代表的酒店业者及专家便就当地酒店业开发与融资的机遇与挑战进行了讨论。
在过去，即便没有来自美国的旅游者，古巴依然是加勒比海地区的第二大旅游胜地。如今，随着美国逐步放宽了对古巴的通行限制，酒店业者和投资商纷纷开始计划进军古巴市场。
在“古巴：发展与投资机遇”民宿大会座谈小组会议中，古巴方面的专家就当地酒店发展及运营的机遇与挑战问题与酒店业者进行了谈话。
机遇
新倡导团体“接触古巴”（Engage Cuba）会长詹姆斯·威廉斯（James Williams）表示，古巴每年的入境游客人数已经非常可观，而一旦美国解除了对古巴的旅游限制，这一数字还将显著增长。目前，美国公民已被允许以12种理由进入古巴，包括教育、美国政府公务及新闻业。
詹姆斯·威廉斯还表示，“古巴通行状态得到了缓解，但旅游仍为一项禁制。尽管如此，去年古巴依然是加勒比海地区第二大旅游胜地，或者说国际旅游目的地。我们预计今年（任期将满）的议员议会将……针对美国的旅行禁令采取一些行动，所以你们现在正在谈论的是古巴又会增加150万至三四百万的美国游客。”
古巴酒店容量已几近达到峰值，人们正快速尝试着建造更多的酒店。古巴境内，对美国游客存在的“庞大的、潜在需求”以及整体的旅游动态变化使当地酒店的建立及管理变得相对容易。古巴大使馆经贸办公室公使Ruben Ramos Arrieta也对古巴存在众多机遇一事表示认同。他指出，“古巴酒店业是第一个从1980年代起便开始对外国投资开放的行业，所以我们拥有打过25年交道的外国同行。如今，古巴……正在转变，经济活动发生了变化。”
挑战
战略性度假服务总裁David Oliver指出，随着机遇而来的便是风险。因为古巴市民受教育程度达到100%，当地酒店员工期待拥有好的薪资水平和更好的生活质量。“古巴人知道自己拥有什么，他们拥有一项珠宝，只需稍微进行抛光。但是他们知道自己拥有什么且并不打算将其拱手相让，因此不要认为玩桌上到处都散布着可以轻松拾起的钱财。”
据座谈小组成员透露，古巴居民仍使用旧的比索货币，而游客们则使用新的比索。尽管威廉斯称最终将对两种货币进行协调，但因为人们不知道何时会产生变化，也不知道将会带来的影响，这将给投资者们带来挑战。威廉斯还指出了其它关键性风险问题，这些问题在美国和古巴双方业务中均存在。
“对于古巴来说，一个非常独特的风险在于，任何交易中的参与双方都需面临古巴不断变化着的法律法规体制。你要面对美国的法律制度，这项制度正以有效的速度放宽限制，但依然是一个随时变化的目标……我们迫切地期待从奥巴马政府的掌控下获得另一轮政策的缓解，这将使酒店及美国的业务在古巴的运营变的更为容易，然而目前正有一轮（总统）选举……这将进一步带来不确定性。”詹姆斯·威廉斯称，古巴已经经历了一些主要的、且相当重要的经济变革。
“他们提出了一种现代的外国投资法案，他们创造出了许多激励措施，并且更加积极和开放地吸引外国投资，然而，因为他们正在经历自我在古巴的部分改革完善或更新过程，这仍是一个变动着的目标。所以确实存在这样的问题，你需要（花时间）去分析一种情况，这可能不会是从现在（从今天）算起的六个月，可能是从现在开始算起的两年或者三年。那样才会带来改变。”
但是Ruben Ramos Arrieta谈到，在古巴投资和酒店发展的风险很小。“此刻，你拥有古巴近66,000个房间中的65,000个房间，其中约45,000个房间由外国公司及合资企业管理……这意味着在古巴超过75%的房间在同外国同行进行业务往来。”