Prime Minister, Dr. the Right Honourable Keith Mitchell is impressed with the progress of work on the Kimpton Kawana Bay project.
During a recent tour of the project site, Dr. Mitchell, accompanied by Parliamentary Representative for the area, Honourable Nickolas Steele, witnessed the start of work on the construction of the fourth and final building. The project is expected to be completed in 2021, with the official opening likely to take place in 2022.
The development will comprise 133 rooms and 31 suites. Dr. Mitchell welcomed the additional room stock and expressed confidence that the tourism industry will recover from the current impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
At present, up to 140 workers are employed and that number is likely to increase by about 100 as construction of the fourth building begins in earnest and outfitting of all buildings gets underway.
Once open, the hotel is expected to provide 300 direct jobs and the spin-off factor will provide for another 800 indirect jobs.
Dr. Mitchell said, “I must commend the project developers and investors for creating this idea and executing it. We welcome the modifications made along the way to make this an even bigger project than was initially envisioned and we look forward to the end product – the completion of construction and the formal opening in 2022. We expect Grenada’s tourism product to be revived in the not too distant future and developments like these help to expand and improve our offering.”
Kimpton Kawana Bay is an approved project under Grenada’s Citizenship by Investment (CBI) Programme. Through this programme, persons can invest at the approved pricepoint starting at US $220,000 and through a very thorough due diligence process, can qualify for Grenadian citizenship.
Dr. Mitchell said, “I am also convinced that Government’s decision to initiate the CBI Programme was certainly a correct one. For persons who may not understand, projects likes these play a significant role in job creation, impacting the lives of hundreds of Grenadian workers. A lot of local labour has been utilised and this creates enormous spinoffs in the local economy and this is in keeping with the kind of model that this Government has consistently promoted. As we see more of this with the Range Developments project in St. David and the Grenada National Project in St. Patrick, I can say that the CBI programme has been such a blessing for Grenada.”
The CBI Programme has become a significant revenue generator for Government. In the first half of this year, the programme accounted for close to US $21 million in Government revenue.
