Terrorism in Europe would not improve the tourism industry in Malta and if anything it would have a negative effect, according to Beppe Bugeja, managing director, charter division, of Malta's FTI Touristik, a major German tour operator.

Speaking yesterday during the re-launch of FTI's Funf vor Flug, a specialist last-minute tour operator that was already very successful up to two years ago, Mr Bugeja said:

"A couple of bombs here and there will not solve the Malta tourism problem. If anything, it would be negatively affected."

The current year, he said, was a difficult one but in spite of that FTI was back in business.

Mr Bugeja said that while some travel agents in Germany were saying that bookings would be 13 per cent down this year compared with last year, FTI was calculating it would be about 30 per cent up.

He said that FTI was still unable to calculate how many tourists it brought to Malta last year but it would probably be substantially increasing the number this year.

The number of tourists from Germany would also increase from other agencies, he said.

However, Malta was less value for money than other destinations, he said. "Our hotels cannot compare with those of our competitors. We have to start selling Malta instead of our hotels."

Funf vor Flug's main character was its ability to sell holidays on a cash and carry basis and this complemented FTI's and Big X-tra's other sales channels and further strengthened FTI's position in the German market.

In October 2003, part of FTI's original management team, who were running the new tour operator Big X-tra, repurchased FTI from Airtours. The "new" FTI was launched last December.

Mr Bugeja launched the re-branding of FTI's inbound company in Malta, Frosch Touristik (Malta) Ltd, as FTI Services Malta. This was in keeping with FTI's worldwide image, he said.

He said that Joe Gauci, currently managing director of FTI Services Malta, was entrusted with additional responsibilities at head office level. These would include financial control of FTI's international divisions.

The newly appointed managing director is Edward Gauci, who had been the marketing manager at Crowne Plaza.