The Employers’ Association in Hospitality, with the support of the Ministry of Tourism, is launching the first online platform, a web exchange, tomorrow, which is expected to connect 645 hoteliers and Croatian producers from around 30 industries.
At the project presentation held today at the Sheraton Hotel, Darko Lorencin, the Minister of Tourism, Tihomir Jakovina, the Minister of Agriculture, Ratomir Ivičić, the director of HTZ, as well as hoteliers and producers from various industries were present.
– A few years ago, UPUHH conducted a study on how much hoteliers in Croatia use Croatian products and what their essential needs are, and we defined three key areas necessary for more intensive cooperation: quality, availability, and price of products. We concluded that most hoteliers use Croatian products; however, in some product groups, such as fish, which is more than 50 percent imported, or pasta, there is still much room for more intensive cooperation, said Kristian Šustar, president of UPUHH.
Minister Lorencin specified his presentation with numbers, stating that 74 hotels from UPUHH’s research (27 percent of total hotel accommodation) use 72 percent Croatian and 28 percent imported products. – There is no foreign company in Croatia that has built hotels; all are domestic builders, and increasingly architects as well. The domestic component in tourism is growing, and the gap between small and large is slowly disappearing. I believe that in a year or two, imports of other categories such as fish and pasta will decrease, said Lorencin. He mentioned that tourism, as a horizontal activity, is most closely linked to the food and construction industries, and that in the future, the creative industry should also have a greater representation.
