Exhibition World Supplements Italy Supplement | Page 7

Italy Supplement
Signs of growth from
the Italian conferences
and events industry
ALESSANDRA ALBARELLI
PRESIDENT,
FEDERCONGRESSI&EVENTI
Federcongressi&eventi, the Italian
meetings industry association,
presents the Italian Survey
of Conferences and Events, a
research project promoted by
Federcongressi&eventi and
conducted by the Graduate School
of Economics and International
Relations of Università Cattolica del
Sacro Cuore (ASERI).
AEFI is
the main Italian
Venue Association, and
counts 35 associated venues,
operating also as organisers.
AEFI members organise or host
around 1,000 events every
year, at an international,
national and local level.
(www.aefi .it)
w w w.exhibitionworld.co.uk
Growing participation
Italy hosted 386,897 events in
2016 of at least four hours with 10
participants minimum, and a total
attendance fi gure of 42,706,559.
Although there was a slight drop
in event numbers (-1.5 per cent
compared with 2015), the growth
of 8.4 per cent in participants and
21.5 per cent in attendance signals
vitality in the sector, which seems
solid, and to have emerged from
the crisis of the last few years.
The positivity is also confi rmed
by the gradual increase in the last
three years both in the average size
of events and in their duration: the
size increased from an average of
69 participants per event in 2014
to 73 in 2016, and duration from
an average of 1.2 days per event in
2014 to 1.4 in 2016.
In particular, events with a
duration of more than one day
saw a 23 per cent increase in
the attendance fi gure compared
with 2015, and accounted for
approximately 11.5 per cent of
the total attendance fi gure in
hotels and other accommodation
facilities in 2016.
Issue 2
2018
7