New International Rankings Reinforce Sydney’s Position as Leading Business Events City

Sydney’s position as Australia’s leading business events city has been reconfirmed in the latest International Congress & Convention Association rankings which places Sydney 22nd in the world for business events, with a record 65 meetings in 2007.

The ranking puts Sydney well ahead of other Australian cities, with the closest, Melbourne, ranked 40th with 36 meetings. Brisbane was the third Australian city, achieving 56th spot with 23 meetings.

SCVB Managing Director Jon Hutchison said Sydney’s result was a great achievement, with its annual meeting numbers reaching a new high.

“Sydney’s meetings industry is continuing to grow from strength to strength, significantly increasing its lead on other Australian cities in 2007,” Mr Hutchison said.

“In fact Sydney accounted for almost one-third of the total number of meetings attributed to Australian cities in the 2007 rankings. This reflects Sydney’s enduring appeal as a business events destination as well as the professionalism of our events industry.”

Mr Hutchison said Sydney had been positioned 20th in the world in 2006 with 51 meetings.

“We achieved an all time record in 2007 with 65 meetings, which was a great result. But clearly we can’t rest on our laurels as we face intense international competition from other cities which are achieving similar growth.”

Sydney’s business events industry had fresh impetus following the NSW Government’s creation of a dedicated events body, Events New South Wales, to develop Sydney and NSW as a centre for public, sporting and business events.

The ICCA rankings are regarded as a leading international measure for the meetings industry, and are based on meetings of 50 delegates or more, which rotate between three countries.

Vienna, Berlin and Singapore took out the top three spots in this year’s rankings with 154, 123 and 120 meetings respectively, while cities such as Beijing, Hong Kong and Taipei continued to climb the ranks and are now positioned 8th, 12th and 18th respectively.

Mr Hutchison said business events remained tourism’s highest yielding sector. A recent convention delegate study conducted by the SCVB and the NSW Government found international conference delegates stay an average 7.2 nights and spend an average $4538 per visit – far more than the expenditure of leisure tourists.

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