Singapore was again named the Top International Meeting Country and Top International Meeting City in the 2013 Global Rankings of the Union of International Associations (UIA).

This is the third year in a row that the city-state bagged the title Top International Meeting Country and the seventh consecutive year, the title “Top International Meeting City, of the UIA which represents 174 countries and 1,465 cities.

In 2013, 994 of the meetings hosted in Singapore met UIA’s stipulated qualifying criteria, increasing 4.4 percent from 2012 and forming 9.4 percent of UIA’s database of meetings.

Also for year 2013, Singapore was named Asia’s Top Convention City for the 12th consecutive year by the International Congress and Convention Association (ICCA). Singapore’s record of 175 ICCA events in 2013 was a 16.7 percent increase from 2012, the strongest year-on-year growth since 2005.

According to Neeta Lachmandas, Assistant Chief Executive of the Singapore Tourism Board (STB), the MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences, Exhibitions) industry continued to play a significant role for the tourism sector, with MICE activities gaining approximately 3.7 billion SGD (roughly 3 billion USD) or contributing 1.1 percent to Singapore GDP in 2012. This is an increase from 0.9 percent of GDP in 2008.

To date, Singapore has secured six world congresses, including the World Congress on Brain Mapping & Therapeutics (SBMT) 2016 and World Congress of the International Society for Diseases of the Esophagus (ISDE) 2016. In addition, the inaugural Asian edition of SpineWeek 2016 is expected to attract over 7,000 delegates to Singapore, making it their largest meeting to date.

Upcoming Asia-Pacific congresses include the Council for Advancement and Support of Education (CASE) Asia-Pacific Advancement Conference 2015, the Regional Dermatology Conference 2016 and the Asia Pacific Congress of Hypertension 2017.-VNA