AUSTRALIA - International visitors to Australia for conferences and conventions plunged by almost a quarter in 2009.
According to the Australian Bureau of Statistics, there were 145,400 convention or conference arrivals to Australia last year, a decrease of 23 per cent year-on-year.
Similarly, the numbers showed a 14 per cent decrease in total business arrivals year-on-year. Total arrivals in Australia remained static at 5.6m.
The most pronounced drop was in conference arrivals from the USA, which fell 35 per cent to just over 17,000. However, the last quarter of 2009 saw a 37 per cent year-on-year increase in American arrivals, which may suggest that the dip is due mostly to last year’s economic downturn.
The statistics were released following the Business Events Council of Australia’s request for AU$20m in federal funding to counteract falling international visitor numbers.
Chairman of BECA, Geoff Donaghy called for a tax incentive offering deductions of up to 120 per cent to encourage Australian companies to spend more on business at home. “Our Asian competitors in particular have seen the true value of business events travel and are outpowering us in marketing dollars,” he says.
The editor of Rank Publishing in Australia, Louis Allen, says: “I suspect the bureaux and convention centres are behind the ‘bail-out’ demands as the big venues have probably taken a hit, as there has been a real flurry of special deals in the past few months.”
“Overall, the picture seems to be that everyone’s meeting closer to home, but meetings are continuing,” he adds.
