Ljubljana jumps to the 50th place in the ICCA international conference statistics
14 May 2012
In 2011, for the third time within the last eleven years, Ljubljana has made it to the list of the world's top 50 conference destinations. Compared to 2010, its jump up in the rankings was considerable.
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Ljubljana Tourism/Ljubljana Convention Bureau along with its key partners has been trying not only to keep, but also to strengthen the position of Ljubljana on the international conference market. In view of increasing competition, not only at home but also elsewhere in Europe and particularly in Asia, this is not an easy task.
The first findings of the ICCA international conference statistics for 2011, published just recently, are very favourable for Ljubljana. For the third time within just slightly more than a decade, Ljubljana made it to the world's top 50 conference destinations, which is a considerable jump up in the rankings compared to the year before. International competition is growing fiercer, which is evident from the fact that in 2006, when Ljubljana also made it to the 50th place, 27 events were enough to assure its palce, whereas in 2011 it won the same place with as many as 40 events. Ljubljana shares its excellent place with Hamburg and Krakow. The table below shows which cities are among its closest competitors.
Place and destination (ICCA statistics 2011) | Number of events |
|---|---|
| 39. Mexico City, Washington D.C. | 51 |
| 41. Montreal, Tokyo | 50 |
| 43. Santiago de Chile, Tallinn | 49 |
| 45. Bogota, Boston; Lima, Toronto | 44 |
| 49. Belgrade | 42 |
| 50. Krakow, Hamburg, Ljubljana | 40 |
| 53. Valencia | 39 |
| 54. Capetown, Porto | 38 |
| 56. Jeju, New Delhi | 37 |
| 58. Cartagena, Glasgow | 36 |
Source: http://www.iccaworld.com/dcps/doc.cfm?docid=1364
Slovenia, on the other hand, scored a total of 54 events in 2011 and placed 44th in the world ranking list, right behind Estonia, Peru and Serbia, and ahead of Romania.
A glimpse at the data for Europe only shows that among 43 named countries Slovenia is ranked 25th, and Ljubljana 27th among 200 named European cities.
A complete analysis of the conference statistics for 2011 will be published at the end of June 2012.
Here in Ljubljana we believe that in terms of infrastructure and organization, Ljubljana's conference product can already now be termed as good and that the increasing recognition of Slovenia and Ljubljana has not gone unnoticed either. Everyone at the Ljubljana Conference Bureau, a part of Ljubljana Tourism systematically engaged in the ICCA statistics, would like to thank all its partners for contributing information about their events and helped considerably improve Ljubljana's ranking. What lies behind the results is business success, reflected in an increase in the number of expert and scientific meetings held in Ljubljana. In the future, the Bureau will focus on a detailed analysis of academic meetings held at university faculties and research institutions as for the moment the statistics in this field remain to be quite unexplored.
The International Congress and Convention Association (ICCA), the world's most global conference industry association, consisting of over 900 member companies and other organizations from 87 countries, has been monitoring the statistics of international conference events since 1972. The ICCA database includes over 10,500 association profiles, which represent one source of the survey, while the other is information gathered by destinations themselves. The more successful they are in collecting information, the better their results. The survey considers meetings of expert and scientific associations which fulfil at least the following criteria: the meeting must have a minimum of 50 participants; it must be held on a regular basis (annually, biannually, etc.; one-time events are not considered); it must be provenly held in rotation between at least three countries.