Iran looking to vastly open up Caspian Sea resort potential

Iran looking to vastly open up Caspian Sea resort potential
Iran's Mazandaran Caspian Sea coastline is to enjoy eight new developments. / hannaneh710
By bne IntelliNews September 2, 2017

Iran’s Mazandaran Ports and Maritime Organisation has finished a feasibility study for the creation of eight new seaside resorts along the Caspian Sea coast, Maritime News Agency reported on August 1.

The tourism development of the Caspian Sea region of Iran – popular with Tehran residents for short breaks – has been skewed by spates of irregular projects. The majority, constructed in the past 15 years, have comprised of private villas. This has caused huge traffic pile-ups along the small winding mountain roads to the region. However, the new push for larger complexes could lift the tourist potential of the underdeveloped area. 

According to the director of cultural heritage and tourism for the region, Delawar Bozorgnia, the eight locations have been selected to prompt direct investment while cutting red tape for future development applications.

He added that the projects have already been pushed through the approval stages, despite no investment applications having yet been officially being lodged.

Bozorgnia said that the only way seaside resorts will ever thrive in the Mazandaran location is with the help of the private sector – particularly in terms of foreign direct investment.

Current figures on annual tourism rates for the three northern Caspian regions - Gilan, Mazandaran and Golestan - are not known, as the majority of people visiting usually arrive and depart in private vehicles. However, it is estimated that millions of people a year make the trip northwards.

Foreign investment trickling in
In 2016, Spain’s Melia International Hotel Group closed a contract for the first foreign-invested hotel project on the Caspian Sea coast seen since the revolution. The project in Salman Shahr (formally called Motel Ghoo) is currently in the finishing stages and comes with two 130-metre towers, as well as European-style restaurants.

“We firmly believe in Iran’s tourism potential,” Melia chief executive officer Gabriel Escarrer said in a statement reported by Bloomberg last year. “We have always been pioneers in the development of new markets.”

The hotel would provide “all of the luxury services and facilities expected of a five-star hotel,” with seven restaurants and bars, over 1,300 square metres of meeting and banquet facilities, two swimming pools, a spa, and diverse leisure and shopping facilities.

Meanwhile, the United Arab Emirates’ Rotana Hotels is also in the early stages of locating a new site along the Caspian Sea coast as part of its Iran expansion plans. The hotel chain is already building one new large complex in second city Mashhad while also looking for several sites in Tehran.

Way back when, Americans brands used to rule
Prior to the 1979 Iranian Revolution, the US’s Hyatt operated a large five-star hotel on the Caspian coast near the city of Ramsar. However, following the emergence of the Islamic Republic, the hotel along with its Tehran operations were forcibly nationalised.

State ownership of the former luxury hotel resulted in the building falling into a shockingly poor condition, with mould and damp afflicting the premises.

Marriott International has also expressed its interest in returning to Iran following the entry of other hotel groups. Its flagship hotel in Tehran was also seized during the 1979 Iranian Revolution.

Marriott's Alex Kyriakidis, president and managing director for the Middle East and Africa said: "Today, Marriott International, being a United States publicly floated company, is precluded from doing business in Iran. Depending on what happens in the future and what agreements are reached between the United States and Iran, if the doors open legally to doing business in Iran, we would be very keen to pursue that opportunity."

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