Cox's Bazar is set to get a new eco-friendly resort in May to cater to upmarket tourists from home and abroad.
The
resort -- Royal Tulip Sea Pearl Beach Resort -- is being built on 14
acres of land at Inani, some 20 kilometres away from Cox's Bazar, with
an investment of around Tk 500 crore.
“We have chosen Inani to
set up the five-star property thanks to its rich coral wealth and
turquoise,” AHM Mokbul Hossain, its chief executive officer, said at a
press conference in Dhaka yesterday.
The resort, which would come
with 493 rooms, will be one of the biggest in South Asia, according to
its Managing Director Aminul Haque.
The facilities include: two
large swimming pools, spa, billiard room, fitness centre, amphitheatre,
landscape garden, three restaurants and children's play zone. The
property will also house a water park.
The resort will be
operated by Europe's Louvre Hotels Group, which is allied with Golden
Tulip Hospitality Group operating in the upper- and luxury segments of
the market. Cox's Bazar has immense potential to attract foreign
tourists as it is the largest unbroken sea beach in the world, said
Vimal Singh, managing director of Golden Tulip South Asia.
Currently,
it has 16 operational hotels across leading business and leisure
destinations in India, with plans to establish 50 operational hotels in
the Indian subcontinent by 2015, he said.
Haque,
who already owns three-star hotel Sea Crown in Cox's Bazar, started
construction for the resort in October 2010. A franchise and management
agreement was signed with Louvre Hotels in July last year.
Prime Bank and other nine lenders raised Tk 85 crore in syndicated loans in 2010 for construction of the resort.
The resort is an eco-friendly property; wastes and water will be recycled and solar power will be used, Haque said.
It
will also be the first hospitality property to introduce the timeshare
concept in Bangladesh. Timeshare is a form of ownership or right to the
use of a holiday property in which multiple parties hold rights to use
the property.
The model also allows members of a hotel to swap or
exchange time with another affiliated hotel or resort anywhere in the
world depending on availability.
Timeshare members of the resort
will be able to use the facilities of Interval International-affiliated
2,500 hotels and resorts in over 75 countries.
A member will be given seven days to spend in any Interval International-affiliated resort every year, he added.
