Abu Dhabi Leads the Charge
Global View
By Rohit Talwar
In the midst of a global economic downturn, United Arab Emirates capital Abu Dhabi is actually bucking the trend and taking massive strategic steps to grow its meetings sector. At the city’s Gulf Incentive and Business Travel Market on March 31, the Abu Dhabi Tourism Authority announced an ambitious strategic initiative designed to stimulate the growth of the meetings sector.
The Advantage Abu Dhabi initiative will catalyze and seed innovative and viable business events that are aligned to the government’s 2030 Economic Vision. Based on a venture capital model, the initiative will support the MICE segment in growing its contribution to Abu Dhabi’s long-term economic, social, human resource and infrastructure development goals. The program will also lead-arrange financial and/or nonfinancial resources to enable meeting planners and exhibition and conference organizers to develop new business events in Abu Dhabi
The move could not come at a better time for the area. The Middle East region is strategically well positioned to capitalize on the growing economic strength of Asia, where countries such as China and India are already pulling out of the downturn. The Middle East will be a critical focus for business events for companies and organizations in Asia—particularly in India where security concerns are forcing firms to think carefully about where to locate key events without massively extending travel times for participants. Global events traditionally based in Europe and the U.S. will increasingly move to the Middle East because of its central position on the map. Almost two-thirds of the world’s population is within eight hours flying time from the Middle East, which makes it great for international events.
Abu Dhabi also has the facilities required to deliver quality meetings—a world-class exhibition center and a growing base of quality hotels. In addition, attracting world-class training providers in the sector will help Abu Dhabi build up hospitality education as an offering for others in the region. An estimated 4 million new jobs could be created in the travel and tourism sectors across the region by 2020.
The creation of new jobs will also act as an important contributor to the development and diversification of Abu Dhabi’s economy. Developing the meetings sector will bring large numbers of business people to the Emirate and generate return interest, which, in turn, will provide a well-structured and thought-through role model for how to put the right infrastructure in place to grow an economically important industry. This is one of the clearest and most comprehensive plans I have seen anywhere in the world for developing a strategic meetings sector. One+
ROHIT TALWAR is a global futurist and CEO of Fast Future, which specializes in researching, consulting and speaking on the future of the meeting industry. His book, Designing Your Future, was published in August.