THIS year’s Gulf Incentive, Business Travel and Meetings Exhibition (GIBTM), to be held at the Abu Dhabi National Exhibition Centre (Adnec) from March 28 to 30, will be the biggest ever in the show’s five year history, with higher numbers of visitors and exhibitors expected.
GIBTM 2011 aims to attract more than 2,000 industry professionals from all the many sectors who stage conferences, exhibitions and incentive meetings including 300 hosted buyers and more than 250 exhibiting companies. Around 40 per cent of attendees come from across the Middle East while three in every five reflect the international mix of the event.
Lloyd Kenyon, exhibition manager of GIBTM, explained that the growing importance of the Middle East within the global economy has been a major driver for the success of GIBTM. “This is the only international exhibition in the Middle East dedicated entirely to the business of meetings and events and it provides the perfect business platform for both international and regional venues, hotels, destinations and suppliers to meet with local, regional and international meeting planners, incentive travel buyers and those involved in the global meetings and events industry,” he said.
“The show is growing in size year on year as more and more people understand the relevance of what is on offer and how they can utilise this information within their own sectors. In fact, there has never been a more important time to invest in face-to-face meetings between the suppliers of the services and those wishing to take advantage of them.
“Hosted Buyers in particular can benefit from our pre-scheduled appointment system, which provides buyers with a schedule of up to 10 one-on-one meetings with suppliers each day. This is particularly useful to buyers who have very short lead times and who are therefore more likely to go to suppliers with whom they have already developed a good relationship.”
This view is echoed by Thorsten Kolbinger, managing director of Ungerboeck Software EMEA, who says: “GIBTM is an important industry event for us because we see the Middle East market offering high potentials due to its growing meeting community. GIBTM is the ideal place to meet all the relevant people in one place. We have already exhibited there very successfully for the last four years and do not want to miss the opportunity to exhibit again in 2011.”
And Elif Balci Fisunoglu, general manager of the Istanbul Convention & Visitors Bureau (ICVB) adds that more and more incentive groups and corporate events are looking for new destinations for their next events saying: “At ICVB, we play a very important role in promoting our destination at the meeting industry trade shows and events. We are happy that we will promote Turkey and Istanbul again at GIBTM with the great support of the Turkish Ministry of Tourism & Culture and the Turkish Tourism Office in Dubai. We plan to increase our marketing activities within the region in the near future and host familiarisation trip groups from the region to Istanbul in 2011.”
Khalid Al Zadjali, head of overseas promotion at the Oman Ministry of Tourism adds that Oman expects a 10 to 15 per cent increase in tourism in 2011. “We are therefore attending business travel shows such as GIBTM so that we can recognise new trends, best practices and network well to promote Oman as a business travel destination,” he says.
GIBTM will present a diverse range of subjects in its seminar programme which underline the event’s commitment to raising industry standards and encouraging learning and development. This year there will again be a number of seminars taking place on the exhibition floor itself in order to make it easier for everyone to attend. “Of particular importance this year is our targeting of the private sector since there are still many who are not aware of the excellent deals and opportunities there are out there,” Kenyon added.