At the recently concluded 47th Skål Asia Congress in Macau, Skål International signed an MoU with PATA to jointly promote responsible tourism in Asia.
Attendees were reminded of the growing importance of Asia at this year’s congress, a bright spot for the association as it grapples with declining membership globally.
Skål Asia president Robert Sohn said: “Asia is the only area in the world where Skål International is experiencing strong growth. In the region, we achieved an increase of 14.7 per cent in the number of members, compared to one year ago and currently there are about 2,400 members in 41 Clubs in Asia.
“This should be noted, since especially the number of members worldwide has decreased.”
Skål statistics since last year revealed that the number of countries in the world with a Skål Club have decreased from 84 to 83, while there was no change to the 19 countries in Asia that has Skal clubs, Sohn pointed out.
“Club wise Skål International lost four clubs going down from 359 to 355 clubs while Skal Asia increased its number of clubs from 40 to 41, and in terms of membership Skal Asia increased its numbers by 311 going up from 2,114 to 2,425,” he elaborated.
Skål International Delhi took over the mantle of the largest Skål Club in the world.
Work is under way to open Skål clubs in more countries. Lebanon, the UAE and Vietnam are some of the countries that are interested to join Skål Asia. Sohn also hopes “the opening of many clubs in China will be a reality soon” with collaboration with Skål’s Macau team .
