Lack of accommodation is one of the biggest fears of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) but Alvaro Brito Bezerra de Mello, the President of the Brazilian Hotel Association, claims that there has been a boom in building new hotels since Rio was awarded the Games in October 2009.

It was announced earlier this month that Hyatt is to build its second hotel in Brazil in Rio. 

The 408-room Grand Hyatt Rio de Janeiro will join Hyatt's Sao Paulo property as the group's flagship property in the country.

The ocean front hotel will be located in the upmarket Barra da Tijuca, a district which enjoys nearly 30 kilometres of beaches and which is often known as the Brazilian Miami.

The area will host much of the city's Olympics.

The hotel will feature two restaurants, a lounge/bar, pool bar, patisserie, fitness centre, spa, a 900sqm ballroom and a further 1,300 square metres of meeting and function space.

Alvaro said the announcement was part a "favourable" trend in the creation of new hotel rooms before the games, thanks mostly to incentives from the city.

He claimed that 9,000 new hotel rooms have been announced since Rio was awarded the Games last year.