Bill Barnett carried on by saying Mandalay was not currently in favour with tourists and many now gave it a miss and opted to travel straight to Bagan or Inle Lake. He noted that the national government’s push to promote hospitality had encouraged investors to plough money into building or opening hotels and guest houses, even when they did not have any prior experience in the field.
Mr Barnett finished off by comparing Mandalay and Vietnam. He explained that there was now a profusion of boutique hotels and guest houses in all the major Vietnamese tourist destinations and the knock-on effect was a glut of rooms which saw weakened demand for accommodation at the bigger hotels.
Figures from the Myanmar Hotels and Tourism Bureau show that Mandalay had 76 accommodation venues with a total amount of 3,350 rooms in 2011. This had increased to 135 hotels and 5,586 rooms by the end of last year. Another 30-plus establishments are due to open by year’s end and will add even more rooms to the grand total.
Too many new accommodation options in Mandalay
News in Asia
Tourism industry experts in Southeast Asia have warned that uncontrolled construction of new guest houses in Mandalay is leading to a massive oversupply of tourist accommodation. The director of Phuket-based C9 Hotelworks claims the Myanmar town’s quantity of hotel rooms far outweighs its attraction for tourists.