Zubair Qureshi
Ambassador of Switzerland Thomas Kolly Wednesday evening hosted a reception-cum-dinner at his residence to celebrate the recent successful launch of the Swiss Proficiency of Hospitality Management Executive Education Programme— École hôtelière de Lausanne (EHL)—at Serena Hotel.
Despite drizzling and winds, a good number of friends and colleagues had turned up to greet the ambassador on the launch of the premiere hospitality service in Pakistan.
Two representatives from EHL, Professor Dr Sowon Kim and Mr Frank and Special Secretary (Europe) Ministry of Foreign Affairs Dr Aman Rashid were among the guests Ambassador Kolly particularly mentioned, the first two for their expertise in hospitality service and Ambassador Aman for his knowledge and understanding of the programme as he has served as Pakistan’s ambassador to Swtizerland for three years.
CEO of Serena Hotel Aziz Boolani, new Italian ambassador-designate Andreas Ferrarese, ambassador of the Netherlands, Wouter Plomp, Norwegian Ambassador Kjell-Gunnar Eriksen, Deputy Head of Mission Swiss embassy Bernhard Furger and some notable figures of the town were among the guests who attended the reception and enjoyed listening to the Swiss experts on hospitality service.
In his welcome remarks, Swiss Ambassador Thomas Kolly said EHL was among the top names in hotel management and its cooperation with Serena Hotels will augur well for the hospitality, hotel and tourism sectors of Pakistan. Pakistan, the ambassador remarked, was no longer categorized as poor country, it is now a country with moderate income. Thus the nature of cooperation between Pakistan and Switzerland was changing with many new projects and initiatives in the pipeline. He welcomed the Swiss experts from EHL to Pakistan and wished they could spend a useful time in Pakistan.
While expressing his views about the launch of EHL and its cooperation with Serena Hotels, CEO of Serena Hotels Aziz Boolani said it was a dream come true. It took us 18 to 19 months to materialize this cooperation and formally launch EHL at Serena Hotels, he said. The programme he said would greatly help in capacity building particularly in the area of Human Resource. Pakistan he said was bestowed with huge potential in tourism and several groups and businesses were investing in this particular sector. They can greatly benefit from the presence and services of EHL in Pakistan, said Aziz Boolani.
I am delighted to take the first significant step in our partnership with Ecole hôtelière de Lausanne, by bringing international executive education grounded in cutting edge knowledge, experience and innovation to Pakistan, he said adding the premium hospitality executive education programme aims at capacity building of senior-to-mid-level executives of Pakistan’s tourism and services sector.
These best practices will allow us to reach and exceed global standards of excellence in Pakistan, he further said.
Dr Sowon Kim who is scheduled to gives series of lectures to the senior management on cutting edge service in line with the standards of EHL said she was delighted to be in Pakistan. “It is a colourful country beyond my expectations and I look forward to visiting Pakistan again,” said she as she is due to leave on Saturday (tomorrow).
