The hospitality market of the Middle East and Africa (MEA) is on track for growth with a total of 124,823 rooms under construction in the region, said a report.

Of the total, about 93,984 are under construction in the Middle East – up 15.5 per cent in year-over-year (y-o-y) comparisons, while the rest are in the African region, according to the May pipeline report from STR, a source for global data benchmarking.

Saudi Arabia topped the MEA list for the largest number of rooms under construction with 40,145 rooms in 95 hotels. Three other markets in the region reported more than 5,000 rooms under construction: the UAE (32,604 rooms in 116 projects), Qatar (9,147 rooms in 37 projects) and Egypt (4,775 rooms in 14 projects).

Africa also reported continued development, with 30,839 rooms in 171 hotels under construction, a 0.3 per cent increase in year-over-year comparisons. Angola reported the largest number of rooms in the with 4,451 rooms in 32 hotels.

The report also highlighted rooms under contract for MEA, showing 159,711 rooms in 581 hotel projects under contract in the Middle East (up 3.8 per cent from May 2016) and 58,501 rooms in 318 projects under contract in Africa (up 3.7 per cent from May 2016).

Under contract data includes projects in the in-construction, final planning and planning stages but does not include projects in the unconfirmed stage.