Hotel beds rise to 1 600 in Kariba

Conrad Mupesa

Mashonaland West Bureau

The drive to improve hotel beds in the Kariba resort town is gathering traction amid revelations that these have increased by over 150 percent since last year.

In 2024, the town, predominantly a tourist and fishing area, had a mere 600 beds against a demand of over 2 000.

With the coming in of various players, the majority being local, the number has risen to 1 600 with more expected.

However, the majority of these are not registered. Elyson Chigerwe, the acting deputy director of the Ministry of Tourism and Hospitality Industry, emphasised the need to increase beds in the resort town.

“We have a drive to increase beds in the town and across the whole province as the tourism sector is booming,” he said.

“We have over 700 registered beds and many are unregistered.”

A hotelier, Mr Patrick Kuona, who is eyeing to construct more facilities along the Zambezi basin from Victoria Falls to Kanyemba, said more players should invest in the sector.

“There is a need for people to invest in the sector so that Kariba becomes as competitive as Victoria Falls is. We want to contribute to these growing numbers,” he said.

The resort town also now boasts of a 750-seater conference facility at Tamarind, whose commissioning will be done soon.

The state-of-the-art conference facility is the biggest in the province and third after the HICC and Elephant Hills in Victoria Falls.