Number of ICCA meetings for Asia-Pacific cities in 2016
The International Congress and Convention Association (ICCA), has recently released its latest Annual Statistics and Rankings. In its 2016 report, Macao has obtained promotions in several facets and the results are encouraging. Namely, Macao jumped to 72nd in worldwide ranking, while it was up to 17th in Asia-Pacific. Furthermore, 37 international meetings held in Macao were recognised by ICCA, the highest number of international meetings in the last decade.
ICCA is the world's foremost conference organisation. It was founded in 1963 and has a membership of more than 1,000 governmental organisations, exhibition related companies and convention centres in more than 100 countries. Each year, ICCA prepares a report ranking the number of ICCA meetings held in each country and region/city. This authoritative report is widely recognised in the industry and is also an important reference for professional organisers in the selection of ideal conference location. Macao currently has a total of seven ICCA members from governmental departments, hotels, professional conference organisers and conference service providers.
There are stringent requirements for ICCA assessment: such conferences must be organised regularly by an international association/organisation event (excluding corporate meetings), in rotation in three or more countries/regions with no less than 50 participants. According to the latest ICCAAnnual Statistics and Rankings, 37 international meetings held in Macao were recognised by ICCA in 2016, showing an increase of nineevents as compared to the total of 28 in 2015, and it’s the highest number of international meetings in the last decade. As for ranking in Asia-Pacific, Macao ranked 17th in 2016, up four places compared to 2015. Regarding worldwide city ranking, Macao jumped 21 places to 72nd in 2016 after first reaching the global top 100 in 2015, and is currently placed above Brisbane (Australia), Auckland (New Zealand), Busan and Jeju (South Korea). This demonstrates that Macao is a rising star in the conferences and events world and is moving further towards the development of the MICE industry, with the strategy “Priority to Convention”. Additionally, with the gradual completion of large convention and exhibition facilities, the Macao exhibition industry has developed rapidly, attracting more international conferences to the city.
The Macao Trade and Investment Promotion Institute (IPIM) officially became an ICCA member in August 2012 and has actively participated in all ICCA activities, and seized the opportunity for dialogue with meeting managers, professional meeting organisers and related international meeting institutions. IPIM has launched the “One-Stop Service” for MICE Bidding and Support in Macao, to provide support services for meeting organisers that are interested in holding events in Macao. The ICCA online database, with over 17,000 international meeting data points, has also allowed IPIM to search for potential meetings to bid for them to be heldin Macao. This has attracted even more international meeting organisers to hold their activities in the city.
According to data from Macao's Statistics and Census Service (DSEC), there were a total of 1,276 conferences held in Macao in 2016. Among which, 693 (54.4%) were corporate meetings, 336 (26.3%, including ICCA recognised meetings and meetings held by other associations and organisations) were organisation/association meetings, 43 (3.4%) were major conference, and 55 (4.3%) were exhibitions.
