TTGassociations Publications January 2019 | Page 6

Association meetings face
threat of predatory conferences
By S Puvaneswary
Predatory conferences – illegitimate con-
ferences created purely for profit and feed
off eager academicians and PhD students
looking for short cuts to get their works
published or to speak at international
conferences – are jeopardising attendance
at and performance of legitimate ones.
This warning came from Noor Ahmad
Hamid, regional director Asia Pacific of
ICCA, who spoke at the recent Union of
International Associations (UIA) Associa-
tions Round Table Asia-Pacific 2018 in
Kuala Lumpur.
Noor explained that predatory con-
ferences would naturally present poor
quality content, the fact masked by glossy
websites that imitate the real thing, thus
fooling sincere delegates who would pay
for registration fees.
Noor identified examples of such
conferences in his presentation, but had
asked for attendees to refrain from taking
the information beyond the room.
While ICCA had come across various
“questionable conferences” by dubious
organisers and had alerted its members,
Noor noted that there is no authoritative
body to monitor predatory conferences
and therefore data is lacking to indicate
how extensive their impact is.
Offering tips on identifying predatory
conferences, Noor said to look out for
missing contact information or organisers
that have scheduled several conferences
on different fields of expertise on the
same day but at different locations.
Speaking to TTGassociations after the
presentation, Jeffers Miruka, president of
the African Society of Association Execu-
tives, shared an example of a predatory
agriculture conference in July 2018. It had
a website very similar to the legitimate
conference but used a different URL and
venue. Registration fees were also col-
lected from interested parties.
“The minute the organisers knew that
they had been discovered, they shut down
their operations. However, organisers of
the legitimate conference were (affected).
The turn-out at their conference was
poor as damage had already been done,”
Miruka elaborated.
He said demand was fuelled by
ASAE deepens reach in Asia-Pac
A new Certified Association Executive
our attendees to share what they do and
(CAE) programme and continually im-
to learn from one another.”
proved content at its annual Association
While attendance at the conferences
Leadership Forum Asia Pacific confer-
here has not grown significantly since
ences are among the investments the
2015, Greta Kotler, chief development &
American Society of Association Execu-
credentialing officer, said the “calibre of
tives (ASAE) is making to further its
attendees is now much higher”.
reach to associations based here.
Graham shared that many Asian cit-
ASAE president and CEO
ies are keen on hosting future
John Graham said: “Our work
ASAE education conferences.
in Asia-Pacific is part of a long-
Bangkok, Singapore and Yoko-
term vision that started five
hama are among the informal
years ago when we did a study
contenders for the 2019 edition.
to determine which markets
ASAE is also looking to pilot
outside of the US would be the
a CAE programme in Australia
most receptive to our products
this year, before rolling it out to
and services. We found that
the rest of Asia-Pacific.
Graham: stronger
Asia-Pacific holds the most
It is also in talks with the
commitment to
potential.”
Singapore Business Federation
Asia-Pacific
With the completion of the
to bring the same certification
study, ASAE debuted the ASAE
programme to the city-state
Great Ideas in Association Management
soon.
Conference in Hong Kong in 2015.
Besides these efforts, ASAE is keen to
Graham noted that ASAE’s confer-
amplify the legacies left behind by Asian
ences in Asia-Pacific “have changed
associations through its annual Power
along the way” to better suit the needs of of A Awards. Winners have traditionally
association executives in the region.
been North American associations, but
“Our Association Leadership Forum
ASAE hopes to globalise it by including
Asia Pacific this year is a lot more inter-
nominees and winners from the Asia-
active and offers many opportunities for
Pacific region. – Karen Yue
academicians who were desperate and
were willing to pay money to have their
scientific papers approved with guaran-
teed publication in a short frame of time
in order to qualify for further academic
funding. In the case of PhD students,
attending a conference in their area of
expertise or having their research pub-
lished in a journal would be a step closer
towards getting their doctorate.
Miruka added that such conferences
have poor quality presentations
and those who pay to attend
such conferences in order
to gain knowledge end up
disappointed.
Cyril Ritchie, UIA presi-
dent, shared that he had
received invitations to
attend UN conferences
in the past but the
email return ad-
dresses were never
an official one.
Noor: beware of fakes
SG furniture industry
nurtures youths
Singapore Furniture Industries Council
(SFIC) has launched the Youth
Furniture Chapter (YFC) to nurture a
more resourceful and resilient genera-
tion of young leaders in the Singapore
furniture industry.
Mark Yong, SFIC president, said: “Or-
ganisations are now focusing on succes-
sion planning to ensure continuity and
growth. With YFC, we can identify and
put together an agenda to train and men-
tor the right people to step into leader-
ship positions. YFC allows us to have a
formal structure to groom our NEXTGen
leaders to drive sustainable growth over
the long term.”
YFC, headed by Jake Tan, has its roots
in 1999 when it began as a small com-
mittee as part of a leadership succession
plan for SFIC. Today, YFC comprises
about 100 NEXTGen entrepreneurs. SFIC
aims to double this number by end-2019.
YFC’s launch coincided with the
opening of the 4 th ASEAN Youth Furni-
ture Exchange (AYFE) and Digital Forum
in Singapore on November 1, a regular
event that aims to build an intra-ASEAN
business network for the region’s new
generation of furniture entrepreneurs.