Polish Business Survey
Holiday Inn developing at last
Global Hotels Development Group Poland (GHDGP), developer of Holiday Inn hotels, has announced that it intends to open around twenty hotels within the next ten years. Six or seven of them will be four star hotels.
There is already a Holiday Inn in Gdańsk and a second will be opening in Wrocław in January after major delays held it back for over two years.
This will be followed by a hotel in Kraków in July. Further hotels are planned in Warsaw, Katowice, Lodz and Poznan. The rest of the hotels that the group builds will be of lower standard and called Express by Holiday Inn. The first will be completed in December 2001 in Warsaw.
British polystyrene in Poland
Rigips, part of British Plaster Board, has announced that it is to diversify production in Poland. The company wants to make polystyrene.
Up until now it has concentrated on the import and production of cardboard and plaster tiles. Leszek Przybysz, general director of Rigips Polska-Stawiany says that his company decided to increase production due to the high fixed costs of its manufacture. In October 2000 Rigips bought a polystyrene production facility from Polterm. The company then spent PLN2m on a new production line. The whole factory should be producing 250,000 sqm of polystyrene annually.
Dr Witt will not be sold
Andrzej Wojda, one of the joint owners of fruit juice producer Dr Witt has denied rumours that the company is to be sold. Nonetheless a new partner has been found for the company who will increase its share value by PLN10m.
Revolution for goods exchanges
The law on goods exchanges which is now waiting for President KwasniewskiŐs signature would open the way for stockbrokers to offer services in this field as well. A number of brokers have already announced their intention to work with the Warsaw goods exchange.
Long-distance arbitration
The communications ministry was due to make a decision on the dispute between TP SA and Netia on long distance connections on 18 November.
Nothing happened and now the competition and monopolies watchdog UOKiK is to arbitrate.
Customs code fails to simplify
The recently updated customs code has brought the Polish service into line with European Union regulations. On the whole procedures have been greatly simplified, however there are those who are saying that the work of customs officers in this country has been complicated by it. The OZAC, a grouping of customs officials, transport companies and clearance agents says that the new procedures are only benefiting very few.