PARIS, Jan 20 (Reuters) - Cuban Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque, trying to woo French investors, said on Thursday Cuba planned to triple its tourist hotel rooms to 100,000 from the current 33,000.
Perez Roque, addressing the association of French employers MEDEF, said the increase in hotel capacity should be carried out as soon as possible. He gave no dates.
Tourism has driven the Communist island's gradual economic recovery since the crisis caused by the collapse of the Soviet Union.
Perez Roque said the number of visitors had grown by 20 percent annually over the past decade, and Cuba expected two million foreign tourists this year.
He said tourism brought Cuba $2 billion last year.
Turning to other sectors of the economy, he said Cuba produced a record 70,000 tonnes of nickel last year, and oil and gas output should reach three million tonnes this year. He gave no comparative figures for previous years.
Perez Roque said Havana was grateful to France for agreeing to reschedule Cuban debt and providing export insurance credit at the worst of the Cuban economic crisis in the early 1990s, when the island's exports collapsed.
France has become Cuba's biggest grain supplier and its fourth largest trade partner after Spain, Canada and Russia.
French exports to Cuba have increased to 1.7 billion francs ($260 million) in 1998 from 478 million francs in 1992. French imports from Cuba remained virtually static during the period and stood at 330 million francs in 1998.
11:17 01-20-00
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