After Record Year, CIBTM Predicts Record Meetings Growth for China

Following a record year of growth, Reed Travel Exhibitions' China Incentive, Business Travel and Meetings (CIBTM) Exhibition has released research predicting significant growth for the Chinese meetings industry, it announced last week.

The research, CIBTM's fourth "China and Asia Meetings Industry Report," found that meeting buyers in China planned an average of 5.6 events each this year, up from 3.7 last year. Also up, it reported, were average attendance, which rose to 200 this year from 135 last year; average event duration, which rose to 5.5 days from 4.4; and Chinese meeting planner budgets, which rose 34 percent to RMB 2.3 million.

Based on these numbers and others, CIBTM predicts that 64.3 percent of Chinese meeting buyers will plan more events next year than they did this year. Meanwhile, the buyers themselves are even more optimistic, predicting an increase in events volume among 74 percent of Chinese meeting planners.

"There is no doubt that this is a particularly exciting time for all those involved in the meetings industry in China," said Sally Greenhill, managing director of The Right Solution Limited, which produced the report for CIBTM. "China, in light of their growing economy, is now becoming a compelling destination for meetings and incentives, offering a broad and wide range of experiences; not surprising bearing in mind the country has one of the oldest cultures. All indicators point to continued growth from both within China and outbound."

Indicative of Chinese meetings growth is CIBTM itself, which took place Aug. 31 to Sept. 2 and hosted its largest-ever hosted buyer program this year, up 16 percent over 2009.

"The meetings industry in China is now really beginning to take shape," CIBTM Exhibition Manager Jeffrey Xu said in a statement. "We are delighted with the response and feedback at this year's show. In 2009 we launched China Meetings Week and this has clearly increased the profile of the show dramatically, resulting in larger numbers of corporate Chinese buyers — key to the development of the show and its exhibitors."

Comments

blog comments powered by Disqus