The value of business events secured with the help of Tourism Australia’s Business Events Bid Fund Program (BFP) has almost doubled from A$97 million (US$69 million) to reach a record A$187 million in the past three months.
Tourism Australia’s managing director John O’Sullivan said the results demonstrated the fund’s effectiveness in improving Australia’s competitiveness in the global business events market by helping to offset event costs.
He added that this was a “direct result of the combined efforts of the Australian business events industry in securing these events”.
The effectiveness of the BFP is also reflected in the number of applications received, with applications now having reached 79 since the launch. A majority of applications are for international health and direct selling business events.
On average, every dollar invested by Tourism Australia and industry in securing events through the programme has generated A$19 for the Australian economy.
Fourteen events have been secured for Australia since the commencement of the BFP in July 2018, with six of the events publicly announced. They include:
- UITP 2021 Global Public Transport Summit, Melbourne (A$4.6 million in economic value for Australia)
- 2019 SportAccord World Sport and Business Summit, Gold Coast (A$6.7 million in economic value for Australia)
- 145th IATA Slot Conference, Brisbane (A$3.2 million in economic value for Australia
- 13th Congress of International Plant Molecular Biology 2021, Cairns (A$4.2 million) in economic value for Australia
- Society for Freshwater Science Annual Meeting 2021, Brisbane (A$2 million in economic value for Australia)
- IEEE Symposium Series on Computational Intelligence SSCI 2020, Canberra (A$2.2 million in economic value for Australia)
Business events remains one of the most significant sectors of Australia’s visitor economy, and the sector is the second largest contributor to overnight international visitor expenditure after China.
Total expenditure by international business events visitors in the year ending September 2018 was worth A$4.9 billion, an increase of 16 per cent over the previous year.
