THE industrial powerhouse of Suzhou is keen to fortify its presence in the MICE market, with latest efforts zeroing in on Taihu, a scenic area that became one of China’s national wetland parks in 2011.

Suzhou Yuyang Exhibitions was recently launched to spearhead Taihu’s MICE development, according to the company’s marketing department head, Pan Zhuzhu.

Pan said: “In addition, we rolled out a new incentive last Friday, with the local government offering financial subsidies of up to 30 per cent for events with at least 100 pax and RMB100,000 (US$16,073) expenditure in Taihu.”

Pan also informed that international branded hotels like Marriott and InterContinental will debut in the city come 2015, adding to the area’s existing facilities like a yacht club, golf course and convention centre.

Lauding the government’s new-found interest in MICE business, Suzhou Taihu International Conference Center sales department manager, You Jian Xin, said: “For years, Suzhou has placed emphasis on industrial development and our MICE development generally lags behind Hangzhou, which has achieved critical success in this area.

“We have not launched any individual efforts to promote our facility to international markets yet, but are currently following promotion efforts led by Suzhou Yuyang Exhibitions,” he remarked, adding that the centre hosted several high-profile international events in the last few years, such as World Cultural Forum, China-Africa People’s Forum and China-Europe High-Level Political Parties Forum.

Also seeing potential in expanding Taihu’s MICE business, Jason Song, sales department assistant manager, Xiangshang International Hotel, commented: “The government’s austerity drive impacted greatly on hotels, resulting in a big loss of business and revenue, hence hotels are now looking at other ways to make up for the shortfall.”

Meanwhile, Song is looking forward to the competition that the debut of international branded hotels will bring to Taihu.

“Standards will be raised correspondingly and there will be a multiplier effect on all businesses. I’m confident that there will be enough cake for everyone,” he said.

Trade players have remarked that international awareness of Taihu is still on the low side, an observation acknowledged by Pan.

“We’re still in the start-up stage, so we’re now trying to put everything in place. We are building up our branding now by attending tradeshows such as IT&CM China,” she said.

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THE Thailand Convention & Exhibition Bureau (TCEB) is rolling up its sleeves to arrest a decline from the China market as a result of the political problems facing the country.

Pirachat Svetasreni, TCEB’s director – Marketing and Corporate Image Department, played down the China MICE downturn, saying it dropped “just by around one to two per cent” and that China remained Thailand’s number one MICE market. However, the downturn was significant when compared with annual growths from the market of around five to 10 per cent in recent years.

TCEB is at IT&CM China in Shanghai pushing to Chinese buyers the message of safety and the vast range of products Thailand is able to offer. It is also planning a pre-roadshow prior to CIBTM before participating in the show in September, according to Pirachat.

“If we do more promotions, I am confident Thailand can regain the China market easily,” said Pirachat.

Her confidence is also boosted by the availability of a host of luxury offerings in Thailand which can cater to Chinese buyers’ needs today. The China incentive and meetings market has matured, said Pirachat. “Chinese buyers are no longer looking for just value-for-money but for high-quality products and service standards. It is quite different from the past.

“Thailand has the products and the country also has a strategic location that makes it accessible to Chinese groups,” she said.

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MALAYSIAN inbound MICE operators specialising in the Chinese market have reported many booking cancellations from April onwards, as search for the missing Malaysia Airlines’ (MAS) flight MH370 continues, more than a month after the plane lost contact.

The flight, bound for Beijing International Airport, had 239 people on board including 153 Chinese nationals.

Local and international news media have reported growing frustrations among the Chinese over the Malaysian authorities and airline’s handling of the investigations and communications, and a rise in netizens’ call to boycott travel to Malaysia and its products.

Winnie Ng, business development manager at Pearl Holiday (M) Travel & Tour told theDaily that she has so far received seven cancellations from China for meetings and incentives planned for April to June, with group sizes of 150 to 500 delegates.

Ng added: “Some Chinese MICE organisers who cancelled their events in Malaysia said it was because they did not want to fly on MAS while others did not give a reason. Some bookings have gone to South Korea.”

Waning interest from China was also reported by Billy Leong, managing director of BMC Travel, who said two pharmaceutical meetings from Beijing this month were cancelled while new bookings were “coming in very slowly.”

Mayflower Acme Tours general manager, Andy Soo, said: “We have had quite a number of cancellations from China since March. At this point, we cannot tell for sure if it is because of negative sentiments that resulted from the missing MAS flight. Cancellations are common but this time around, it is about 10 per cent higher than usual. The number of new enquiries from China have also softened.

“We will send a team to China soon for a sales visit to meet with MICE planners and operators to acquire first-hand knowledge of what is happening, their plans for the coming months and to gauge sentiments on Malaysia.”

Malaysia Convention and Exhibition Bureau has declined to comment on the cancellations and slowdown in new enquiries from China and what it intends to do to restore Chinese confidence in Malaysia.

Singapore, which is occasionally featured in a twin destination programme with Malaysia, has also seen changes in the preferences of Chinese incentive groups.

Sharing the observation with the Daily, Alicia Seah, marketing communications director of Singapore-based Dynasty Travel, an agency which handles inbound and outbound leisure and corporate events, said some Chinese incentive clients had recently chosen to drop day trips to Malacca from their Singapore-Malaysia itineraries.

Seah, whose company is handling two Chinese incentive groups this month, said: “Our Chinese travellers prefer to stay only in Singapore now, and some have opted to cut short their programme because of the (incident).

For Chinese clients who are interested in extending their programmes from Singapore, Seah said Bintan in Indonesia is getting their attention now.

Other inbound MICE operators in Asian destinations who have witnessed upticks in Chinese bookings this month are, however, not crediting it to a diversion of interest following the MH370 incident.

Raymond, managing director of MG Holiday Indonesia, said: “There has been growth in Chinese MICE bookings to Jakarta for corporate meetings and exhibitions, but I believe that has more to do with growing interest in Indonesia (as a trade market) than (Chinese shifting destination choices from Malaysia to Indonesia following) the aircraft incident.”

Additional reporting by Paige Lee and Mimi Hudoyo.

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ASSOCIATIONS are at a critical crossroads as the baby-boomers for whom they were built are now retiring, leaving a void not just in terms of membership numbers, but the skills set needed to run these societies.

The world over, associations were formed with baby-boomers in mind and were run by committed volunteers from this age group. Now that they are leaving the workforce, “we either face change or death”, said Simon Pryor, CEO, The Mathematical Association of Victoria, Australia.

On the other hand, the knowledge of what younger people are looking for, which may draw them to join associations, is still wafer-thin.

Speaking to the Daily about this crossroads, Pryor said: “To begin with, there are fewer people who are committed to running associations – people who know how to run the board, how to handle volunteers, how to do the trade or represent the trade or profession (as a result of the baby-boomers retiring).

“At the same time, there is a need to understand what the younger people are looking for in support of their professions and the way they want to make a career for themselves or make their business. It’s a world where the jobs available today probably didn’t even exist three years ago, a vast change from my time, when it’s one employee, one job, one bank and your loyalty is rewarded. The world is changing so rapidly and the need to deliver the value and support now is what people need to understand.

“Those associations that stay focused on the baby-boomers generation are the ones which are at threat.”

Pryor gave an example of how associations needed a mindset change in order to stay relevant. “Today if I want to learn how to fly an aeroplane, I can google, watch a YouTube video, (attend) a webinar. Associations prided themselves in the ’80s and the ’90s as the repository of all knowledge about their industry and profession. No longer! Our capacity to access knowledge has just grown with the digital age.

“So what the association needs to do is to become the curator, to be able to tell members that, of all these websites which can tell you how to fly an aeroplane, these are the best. And it’s not necessarily the association’s website.”

Ryan Xia, financial controller of the Tenpin Bowling Association of Queensland, Australia, attests how difficult it is to get the younger generation to embrace bowling, despite membership fee of the association being a paltry A$20 (US$19) per year compared with A$400 upwards annually for sports like basketball.

Xia’s at IT&CM China to share knowledge as well as learn from peers like Pryor on how to survive a generational, cultural and economic gap.

He said: “We have a lack of volunteers, as these people who ‘give back’ do so because they love bowling. However, we don’t find the young people being as enthusiastic about bowling as other sports. Plus, the economy is not doing so well and volunteers are concentrating on running their own lives.”

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ALTHOUGH government meetings are still among the top source markets for China’s MICE industry, the Chinese government’s austerity drive has taken a bite out of the meeting sector, with the country’s industry players now seeing stronger potential in the corporate and association meetings segment.

Speaking during a two-day industry training session hosted by the MICE Committee China Association of Travel Services at Oriental Riverside Hotel in Shanghai, The Alliance of China Conference Hotels, deputy director, Wu Shaoyuan, said: “The number of corporate meetings are on the rise for the past few years while government meetings are seeing declines.”

Corporate meetings in China accounted for 59.7 per cent of the MICE market, which still lags “some 20 percentage points” behind the UK’s 81 per cent, despite the abundance of enterprises and associations across the country, pointed out Wu.

In particular, Wu drew attention to association meetings as a segment with high potential for development, highlighting the benefits this segment could bring to industry players. “With China’s rapidly ageing population, there are more medical and academic congresses addressing such topics as ophthalmology, osteology and odontology,” he said.

“Such meetings also pave for greater mobility to rotate across Chinese destinations, plus the long preparatory period required for such meetings gives ample sales and marketing opportunities for meeting planners, PCOs and groundhandlers, providing higher revenue and a common winning situation for all players,” he added.

In order to improve standards, Wu urged Chinese PCOs and travel agencies to not look upon themselves as mere service providers but also from the perspectives of conference organisers, while at the same time, deploying stronger online and marketing strategies as “weapons” to compete on the global stage.

Dalian Liangyun Hotel deputy director of sales, Xu Zheng, revealed that the property has taken a keen interest in corporate and association meetings. “We suffered a drastic drop in business from the government sector, so we are turning our attention to corporate and association meetings due to the segment’s high revenue factor.”

“The addition of a new MICE centre and the Summer Davos meeting (which alternate between Dalian and Tianjin) in Dalian last year have helped to further promote the city’s meeting potential,” said Xu, who added that the hotel will also roll out initiatives like property-wide wireless Internet access to meet “expectations of international meeting participants”.

Yang Chengfei, deputy general manager of Henan Professional Workers Travel Service, revealed that the Zhengzhou-based firm has just turned its MICE department into a new company – Henan Guangxin Conference & Exhibition Service – to sharpen its focus on developing the meetings segment.

“Beijing and Shanghai are major meeting destinations since many corporate headquarters are usually set up in these two cities, so we still need a lot of support from the government to build up awareness of Zhengzhou,” he added.

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