Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that a total of 97 MICE events were held in Macao in the first quarter of 2022, an increase of 29 year-on-year; the number of participants & attendees rose by 19.7% to 165,000.
There were 76 meetings & conferences held in the first quarter, up by 15 year-on-year; however, number of participants decreased by 6.3% to 6,157. The average duration of the meetings & conferences went down by 0.1 day year-on-year to 0.9 day, while the total floor area used edged down by 0.5% to 32,000 m². Number of exhibitions grew by 7 year-on-year to 14, all of which were organised by non-government organisations. Number of attendees rose by 19.8% to 158,000. The average duration of the exhibitions shortened by 0.3 day year-on-year to 2.6 days, while the total floor area used expanded by 147.0% to 33,000 m². Besides, 7 incentives were held in the first quarter, with 1,540 participants. The average duration of these incentives was 1.2 days and the total floor area used was 8,048 m².
Receipts of the exhibition organisers surged by 64.1% year-on-year to MOP10.19 million, of which 86.5% were generated from rental of exhibition booths and 13.0% were financial support from government/organisations. Expenditure of these exhibitions swelled by 84.6% to MOP8.80 million, with production, installation & decoration and publicity & public relations accounting for 34.1% and 32.9% of the total respectively. These exhibitions recorded net receipts of MOP70,000 after the deduction of expenditure and financial support from government/organisations.
Number of exhibitors soared by 64.8% year-on-year to 692 in the first quarter, and 96.1% of them were locals. Professional visitors leapt by 63.2% to 9,153, with those from Macao accounting for 97.5% of the total. In accordance with the information collected from 368 interviewed exhibitors, 94.1% of their receipts were generated from sales of goods, whereas their expenditure was mainly incurred on rental paid for exhibition booths (72.1% of total) and booth installation & decoration (16.5%).
Regarding comments from the interviewed exhibitors in the first quarter, the proportions of exhibitors who complimented on the ease of access (83.4%) and facilities of the venue (79.6%) increased by 6.5 percentage points and 0.8 percentage points respectively quarter-to-quarter. On the other hand, the share of exhibitors who were satisfied with the promotion of exhibitions dropped by 2.9 percentage points to 68.8%.