The appointment, with effect from 20 November, was confirmed by the IH&RA Board at the 38th annual congress of the association held in London this week from 16-20 November.

Mr Feutré, a Frenchman with over 40 years experience of the hospitality industry, has more than twenty years involvement with professional associations, including fourteen as president and CEO of the Syndicat Français de l�Hôtellerie (1986- ). Vice-president of the Union des Metiers et des Industries de l�Hôtellerie (UMIH), he was also president of HOTREC, the confederation of national associations in the hotel and restaurant industry in the European Union from 1994 to 1998.

Since 1975, he has held office in various French government bodies including the Conseil National du Tourisme, the Observatoire du Tourisme, the Office du Tourisme et des Congrès de Paris, and the Paris Hotels Association, a reservations centre. In recognition of his services to the industry he was made Chevalier de l�Ordre du Mérite. 

After early professional experience in hotels in France and London, in 1968 Mr Feutré became a shareholder in L�Hôtel, a deluxe hotel in the rue des Beaux-Arts, in Paris� fashionable 6th arrondissement, a property in which he retained a controlling interest until 1999.

For the past ten years, he has run own consulting business, the Société Française d�Hôtellerie, de Restauration et de Tourisme. 

Mr Feutré, who served IH&RA as vice-president for the last four years, including two as VP-Europe (1999-2000).