South Africa
can be a source of business inspiration.
How is Meetings Africa doing?
We took over the management of
Meetings Africa in 2012. After
consulting extensively with the local
business events industry and our
stakeholders on how to improve the
show, we decided to:
• Reduce the show from 3 to 2 days
• Create a dedicated Education Day that
all exhibitors can attend
• Position Meetings Africa as a
pan-African trade exhibition (not just
focusing on SA)
• Implement the first hosted buyer
qualification process.
Can you highlight the key
infrastructure/venue developments
in South Africa in the past year and
the year ahead?
Infrastructure, air access and
transportation are some of the key
factors that decision-makers consider
when evaluating bids and proposals from
destinations. Most new hotels in SA have
incorporated meetings infrastructure in
their developments, offering unique
venues to host meetings and conferences.
For example, you can host meetings or
conferences in the Kruger National Park
(i.e., Nombolo Mdhluli Conference
Centre).
Cape Town International
Convention Centre has doubled its
available space, which provides the
requisite capacity to host both
international business events and
domestic conferences and exhibitions at
the same time.
The Graskop Gorge Lift facility in
Mpumalanga is another example of how
infrastructure at unique attractions
enables us to offer clients the ability to
host business at different attractions
across South Africa.
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CONFERENCE & MEETINGS WORLD
These changes have enabled us to
move the show forward in the past seven
years. The hosted buyer qualification
programme improved the quality of the
buyers and helped us attract
better-quality exhibitors. The changes
also led to an increase in the number of
scheduled meetings between exhibitors
and buyers, improving the overall
business output of the exhibition.
Which big conferences are in the
pipeline for South Africa and can you
say a little about your main methods
of bidding?
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ISSUE 100
“The
bureau’s
role in the
bidding
process is
to ensure
the local
association
can focus
on the
scientific
aspects
of the
bid while
bringing
together all
the other
support
services
needed”
SA will host the 37th World
Ophthalmology Congress (WOC) in
2020 in Cape Town, which is expected to
attract over 10,000 delegates from 110
countries. Indeed, the WOC comes to
Sub-Saharan Africa for the first time.
Revenues from the congress will help
support International Council of
Ophthalmology (ICO) programmes
including ophthalmic education,
eye-care delivery, leadership and
society development and the ICO’s
commitment to ‘Building a World
Alliance for Sight’.
As a sales function, the SANCB
searches for potential association
conferences that can be hosted in South
Africa. However, we cannot bid for these
conferences on our own. We need to find
the local association and a champion that
can lead SA’s bid to host the conference.
We also need to find stakeholders that
can assist destination SA to provide the
services required in the association’s
request for proposal.
The convention bureau’s role in the
bidding process is to ensure the local
association can focus on the scientific
aspects of the bid while bringing
together all the other support services
needed in the bidding process.