Compiled by Satyaki Dutta
Crowned as ‘Asia’s Leading Travel Trade Show,’ ITB Asia is returning in its full glory with the highest number of participating National Tourism Organisations (NTOs). In its twelfth year, the ITB Asia 2019 is taking place from October 16 to 18, in Marina Bay Sands in Singapore.
Keeping in line with its stature, the demand and participation rate is sky-rocketing too. The goal is quite successful already, which is evident from the stats and numbers. The demand for being a part is gradually escalating too, from the National Tourism Organisations (NTOs) and Regional Tourism Organisations (RTOs). In 2019, the number of total NTOs and RTOs registered lies at 58, which are already 19 more than 2018 and there is a growth of 23.8percent and 25percent respectively for the exhibition space also compared to 2018.
ITB Asia 2019 has a really good chance to go above and beyond the record of the total number of attendees which was set in 2018 with more than 11,000 interested people. Presently, the largest registered exhibition space are from Russia, Indonesia, Russia and South Korea. From the CIS countries, Uzbekistan will be taking part for the first time and from Southern Asia, major presence include India, Sri Lanka, Bhutan and Maldives.
There is a huge increase in the exhibitors number in Europe, which is 37.8 percent, the majority comes from the Southern and Eastern part of the continent. Macedonia, Montenegro, Czech Republic and Serbia are participating for the first time along with the Czech Republic and Estonia. Hungary and Russia are accompanied by a large array of German RTOs from Berlin, Frankfurt and East Bavaria.
In the case of the exhibitors, 28.6 percent are from the travel agency, 23.6 percent are operators, 10.7 percent NTOs, 22 percent consist of MICE and 8.1 percent includes the transport segment. The major chunk of 62.7 percent comes from Asia, 25.3 percent from Europe and 5.1 percent the American continents.
This growth percentage indicated the potential growth rate in tourism and travel sector on a global scale. The Asia-Pacific region generated 343 million international tourist arrivals in various places in 2018 itself, which is a staggering growth of 6 percent from 2017. With all the collective inputs, the 1.4 billion international tourist arrival was reached in 2018 itself, instead of 2020.
Special themes like Corporate Travel, Destination Marketing, Muslim Travel and Travel Technology will have a major presence here too. The Muslim Travel Market valued more than US$180 billion dominated 2018 ITB Asia and it will continue to be highly relevant in 2019. From 2016 to 2020, it is predicted that the growth will be around 30percent with an approximate 156 million Muslim travellers and by 2026, the estimated total purchase is expected to cross US$ 300 billion, thus doubling the amount in a decade.
We can see that, 79.5 percent of travellers come from Asia- Pacific region, while Europe claims 10.5 percent. North and South America combined stands at 6.3 percent, the Middle- East at 2.7 percent and Africa at 1 percent. 30 percent of buyers come from the MICE segment, matched by the same percentage of corporate sector, and 40 percent from leisure travel.
24.7 percent of the visitors are travel agents, operators and DMC, followed by 19.3 percent hotel accommodation and 10.6 percent Business and MICE, 5.9 percent NTOs and 10.7 percent airlines.
Mostly the visitors are from Asia, at 85.2 percent, followed by Europe at 8.2 percent. The predominant purposes are networking (32.4 percent), information gathering (28.2 percent) and buying (17.7 percent).