Barcelona heads ICCA ranking for first time since 2004

It has been another very good year for the international association meetings industry: ICCA identified a record 12,558 congresses in 2017 (346 more than in 2016, and an historic record). This growth is not new: in its report “A Modern History of International Association Meetings: 1963-2013”, ICCA identified that the number of international meetings doubles every 10 years, a growth that now seems to “slowly transcend into a more mature, but still solid, growth pattern”, says the association.

City ranking: Barcelona on top!

The cities in this year’s top 5 remain the same as they have done since 2015, but Barcelona surpasses Paris and Vienna to claim the top spot, for the first time since 2004. Paris falls to second place and Vienna holds its previous position in joint second place with Paris, and Berlin and London are fourth and fifth. Madrid stays in seventh place, and last year’s other number seven Amsterdam drops out of the top 10 to 16^th place. Prague climbs three places to join the top 10. As in 2016, Singapore, Lisbon and Seoul remain in sixth, ninth and 10^th place respectively. Notable risers are Buenos Aires, jumping from 17^th to 11^th place, Budapest, jumping from 16^th to 12^th, and Hong Kong, jumping from 19^th to 13^th. Rome remains in 20^th place for another year. Newcomers to the top 20 in 2017 are Tokyo and Montreal.

2017 Country rankings: U.S.A. still first

Not been much change in the top 10 country rankings. U.S.A. remains in the number one position. The cities in the top 3 have not changed, with Germany and United Kingdom remaining in second and third place after the U.S.A.’s first. France exits the top 5 and drops to sixth place with the rise of Spain and Italy one place to fourth and fifth, and Japan retains seventh place for a second year running. China P.R. drops one place to eighth. Portugal drops out of shared 10^th place to 11^th in 2017. Argentina falls two spots to 21^st place and Denmark enters the top 20 at 20^th place.

As the association points out, “the report covers a narrow segment of the meetings industry, only including international association meetings that rotate between at least three countries, have a proven attendance of at least 50 participants, and are held on a regular basis. The ICCA rankings should thus not be mistaken as providing an overview of the entire meetings industry”.

ICCA CEO Martin Sirk said: “In a world of disruption and unpredictability, the continuing growth in international association meetings is a welcome anomaly, but is not that surprising. We are still in a period of revolutionary change in terms of scientific and technological advancements, which are transforming traditional association fields such as healthcare and trade. To make sense of the tsunami of new data and information, association communities need to meet. Not just at their traditional, well-established meetings, but in new gatherings specifically invented to serve new academic fields or to reach out to new audiences. These are the pressures that we believe will continue to boost the sector for many years to come.”