FALMOUTH Trelawny — Minister of Tourism Edmund Bartlett has welcomed the investment of the 700-room RIU Aquarelle in Trelawny, hailing the Spanish hotel chain as the first foreign investors to break ground for a hotel construction since the start of the rebound of Jamaica’s tourism industry from the devastating COVID-19 fallout.

On Wednesday Prime Minister Andrew Holness led the ground-breaking ceremony for the construction of the hotel, situated near Falmouth.

“It makes you the first foreign investor to break ground in this wave of recovery. And that makes us very special,” Bartlett said during the ground-breaking ceremony.

He also noted that since the begining of the bounce back of the sector, RIU Hotels has become the second, only to Sandals Resorts International (SRI), to break ground for hotel construction in the country.

“And you are the second to break ground in this wave. The first, of course, was our local star themselves, the Sandals group, that had the ground breaking for the 1,000 rooms, eventually,” Bartlett stated.

The tourism minister also lauded RIU as the country’s largest foreign investor in the tourism industry.

“And, with the groundbreaking today (Wednesday) of this 700 room, it makes you definitely the largest foreign investor in tourism with 3,000 rooms and employing in excess of 2,000,” Bartlett said.

During his sectoral budget presentation, Bartlett announced that the “investment climate is booming”.

“Jamaica is experiencing its largest hotel and resort development expansion in any single year. A total of US$2 billion will be invested to bring 8,500 rooms on stream over the next five to 10 years, resulting in at least 24,000 part-time and full-time jobs and at least 12,000 jobs for construction workers,” Bartlett said.

He also announced on Wednesday he will be leading a team that leaves the island this Friday “to start a mega marketing campaign across the world”.

“And we will be able to say to you on our return — Carmen Riu, the RIU family and all the investors who have confidence in Jamaica in this new wave of investment that’s going to bring 8,000 new rooms, the largest number of rooms ever in the history of Jamaica — that your investment and confidence is well founded, because you have a team that is behind you, and we are going to do the marketing,” he said.

The investment of the 700-room RIU Aquarelle became the seventh RIU resorts property and CEO Carmen Riu noted that the group will continue to do their best to contribute “to the development of Jamaica and its inhabitants happiness and prosperity.”

“After two years of a global pandemic I am delighted to be able to come together with all of you and celebrate these positive developments. I hope I can encourage us all to keep on going and gives us the strength to face any challenging events in the future,” she argued.

The prime minister lauded the Spanish hotel group for investing in their seventh property in Jamaica.

“So this is a remarkable accomplishment for any hotel brand to make seven discrete investments in one location. One destination. This is big!” Holness said.

“It says something about the investors but it does say a lot about the destination. Therefore, on behalf of the Jamaican Government and the people of Jamaica, I want to express my sincere gratitude for your continuous investment in our country and in our tourism product.”