The 2011 International Congress and Convention Association rankings (ICCA) have been released, and London is the biggest climber moving from 14th to seventh place.
The rankings, which profile meetings organised by international associations, which take place on a regular basis and rotate between a minimum of three countries, are a mixed bag of movers and shakers.
The top 10 countries showed little change, with the top six repeating their rankings, led by the USA, Germany and Spain.
The Netherlands and Austria appeared at ninth and 10th respectively, taking theplace of Switzerland, which dropped from 10th to 12th, and Japan, which in the aftermath of cancellations due to the earthquake and tsunami, understandably dropped from seventh to 13th place.
The USA saw by far the biggest jump in the number of events held, up by 136 to a new record 759 meetings.
In the city rankings, Vienna retained its number one status, and below it Paris overtook Barcelona in the second and third place battle. The biggest climber in the top 10 was London, with the 2012 Olympics effect pulling it up from 14th to seventh, and Beijing, which led the way amongst the fast growing BRIC destinations by climbing from 12th to 10th.
“There are always going to be short-term competitive changes to annual rankings, some caused by external factors and some by marketing successes” said ICCA CEO Martin Sirk.
“The most important thing to note is that international association meetings continue to be in tremendously good health when compared with the overall situation in the global meetings industry. We’ve seen consistent annual growth in the number of international association meetings throughout the last few years of global economic instability, something no other sector can claim, even though we’re also hearing about increasing challenges in raising sponsorship amongst a sizeable minority of organisers.”
More than 10,000 regularly occurring events were identified by ICCA members for the 2011 study, a rise of 800 on 2010.
The country rankings were:
1. USA – 759 meetings
2. Germany – 577 meetings
3. Spain – 463 meetings
4. UK – 434 meetings
5. France – 428 meetings
6. Italy – 363 meetings
7. Brazil – 304 meetings
8. China – 302 meetings
9. Netherlands – 291 meetings
10. Austria – 267 meetings
11. Canada 255 meetings
12. Switzerland – 240 meetings
13. Japan – 233 meetings
14. Portugal – 228 meetings
15. Republic of Korea – 207 meetings
16. Australia – 204 meetings
17. Sweden – 195 meetings
18. Argentina – 186 meetings
19. Belgium 179 meetings
20. Mexico – 175 meetings
The city rankings were:
1. Vienna – 181 meetings
2. Paris – 174 meetings
3. Barcelona – 150 meetings
4. Berlin – 147 meetings
5. Singapore – 142 meeting
6. Madrid – 130 meetings
7. London – 115 meetings
8. Amsterdam – 114 meetings
9. Istanbul – 113 meetings
10. Beijing – 111 meetings
11. Budapest – 108 meetings
12. Lisbon – 107 meetings
13. Seoul – 99 meetings
14. Copenhagen – 98 meetings and Prague – 98 meetings
16. Buenos Aires – 94 meetings
17. Brussels – 93 meetings and Stockholm – 93 meetings
19. Rome – 92 meetings
20. Taipei – 83 meetings
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