PESHAWAR: The Khyber Pakhtunkhwa government will revive the Pak-Austrian Institute of Hotel Training and Management to strengthen hotel industry and create jobs for youth in the tourism-rich parts of the province, according to officials.

The provincial government, said an official, had prepared a plan to restore the institute -referred to as PAITHOM in official documents and offer hotel management courses to organise and strengthen hotel industry in the province.`The move is aimed at improving hotel management services in the tourism rich areas of the province with a perspective to facilitate tourists and boost tourism,` he said.

The June 2008 burning of the spacious Malam Jabba Skiing Resort in a Taliban attack was considered the last straw in fading away all hopes of reviving PAITHOM, an Austrian funded project that fell victim to official apathy and nepotism back in the 1970s.

Zahoor Durrani, a tour operator, recalled that the project`s great take-off in the early 1970s proved short lived. `The Austrian hotel management expert, who was conducting and supervising the training courses, left dejected because of interference and favouritism by official circles, he said.

Mr Durrani seconded the provincial government`s bids to revive the institute, terming it an essentially needed move to better hotel services by imparting academic knowledge, prudent workethics and proper hotel management skills.

The province, he added, had a tremendous tourism potential, but its hospitality and tourism industry lacked specialised skills such as high quality housekeeping, reservation, front desk and other guests facilitation services.

`Hotels in Swat and elsewhere in the tourism hot spots in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa make huge profits, but their services are of poor standards and safety features non-existent in a majority of the hotels,` said Mr Durrani, who conducted a foreign-funded census involving some 865 hotels in Swat to identify and revive hotels damaged due to Goodsin2010.

According to the government plan, work on the revival of the institute would begin during the current fiscal. Youth would be enrolled for different courses in the 2013-14 and 2014-15 financial years as part of a strategy to work towards the restoration of PAITHOM in 2015-16 fiscal.`Efforts are afoot to rebuild the hotel at Malam Jabba ski resort and house the institute in it,` said the official.

Mr Durrani said that an office of PAITHOM was still functional in Saidu Sharif, Swat, doing its bids to produce skilled manpower for the local hotel industry.

`They impart some basic training to the students in how to spread bed sheets and reception desk facilities, etc. The effort has proved far short of producing a quality workforce,` he added.

The significance of hotel management to bolster the hotel industry and tourism sector has attracted private sector`s attention in Pakistan.

A Lahore-based college of hotel management, said Mr Durrani, had made a leap forward in setting standards of quality education and producing a professional hotel management workforce.

Taking a cue, the University of Peshawar and three other public sector universities in the prov-ince, including Hazara University, Malakand University and Mardan University, according to sources, have recently undertaken a joint exercise to introduce hotel management courses in the near future.

The addition of hotel management programme would be in addition to their tourism industry related courses.

Similarly, a private entrepreneur from Peshawar, with experience in hotel business, is also reportedly planning to launch a teaching institute on the pattern of the college at Lahore.

However, Mr Durrani said that mere revival of PAITHOM or the creation of institutes in the private sector won`t guarantee job opportunities for the graduates.

`The government should also establish linkages between PAITHOM and the hotel industry through internship programmes, which would benefit both the industry and the graduates,` he said.