Daily Times

KARACHI: A two-week-long Thai food festival will start in the city on Wednesday. The event set to take place at the Beach Luxury Hotel is expected to be attended by many foreign diplomats posted in Karachi, besides a large number of food enthusiasts.

The timing will be from 730pm to 1030pm.

The Thai Consul General in Karachi will inaugurate the festival organised by Avari International Hotels Group in collaboration with Royal Consulate Thailand and Thai Airlines. It is one of the series of events being held to celebrate 70th anniversary of Beach Luxury Hotel and on getting the status of four-star hotel after its renovation and up-grades, said General Manager Beach Luxury, M. Azeem Qureshi at media briefing on Tuesday.

Government in Pakistan’s Honorary Trade Adviser to Thailand and President Pak-Thai Business Forum Arif Suleman; Media Coordinator of Avari Hotels Madiha Owais; Mobin Ansari; and Imran-ul-Haq were also present.

M.Azeem Qureshi said the celebrations were kicked off by holding a basant-food mela two weeks back.

He said Avari Hotels had held various cultural and other entertainment programmes including food and literary festivals, and basant mela in the past as well. Earlier, Pakistan, Chinese and Sri Lankan food festivals

were held and after the month of Ramazan, Turkish food festival was scheduled to be held.

He said Avari Hotels Group through different initiatives had always been working to portray a green and clean Pakistan.

M.Azeem Qureshi said that after Lahore, the dining out culture had reached the mega city of Karachi as well. Thai food festival also would see a large number of food lovers, he hoped.

He informed the media that after China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) hotels had witnessed a 40 percent increase in their revenues and now-a-days one could hardly find a vacant room in four-star and five-star hotels in Pakistan. The increasing occupancy had forced the hotel chains to undertake expansion work.

Avari International Hotels Group had also come up with a big expansion plan titled Avari Express Hotels. Recently, one of their branches has been set up in Multan and soon others would be set up in Faisalabad, Lahore, Rawalpindi and Murree.

Published in Daily Times, March 04^th 2018.