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WTM London 2019 to reveal the latest Global Travel Research

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The most current and thought provoking research into global and regional travel trends will be revealed over all three days at WTM London 2019 (Monday 4 November to Wednesday 6 November).

Research sessions commence in the WTM International Media Centre with ForwardKeys’ research into the UK outbound market. ForwardKeys, which analyze 17 million flights a day, will review the top 50 UK inbound flights, comparing them to last year and five years prior. The session takes place in the Press Conference Theatre (ME170) at 10.30 am on Monday 4 November and is preceded by the chance to network over tea, coffee and pastries during the WTM Press Breakfast at 10 am.

On Monday afternoon, World Tourism Cities Federation (WTCF), will present a session looking at China’s astonishing economic growth, which has created a brand new group of travellers. The session entitled, Booming Chinese Outbound Market, will have a panel of experts looking to discuss the aims at better understanding the Chinese traveller by sharing experiences and expertise from different angles.

It will take place on the dedicated Asia Inspiration Zone at 12.15 on Monday 4 November.

Tuesday morning will see Euromonitor International present a session entitled Megatrends Shaping the Future of Travel. Attendees will discover the latest developments for global travel and tourism performance. This session will give insights into upcoming trends in Europe, Asia, the Americas and the Middle East and Africa. The key focus is on major drivers, consumer behaviour and attitudes that are affecting travel companies’ bottom line. The research will prepare participants with the important knowledge to navigate the year ahead.

Lead by Euromonitor’s Head of Travel, Caroline Bremner, this session takes place at 11.30 am in the Press Conference Theatre.

First thing on Wednesday morning at 10 am in the Press Conference Theatre there is a session, which looks specifically at research around Sustainability in Tourism, conducted by MMGY and Destination International. The research is from a comprehensive survey issued to the global travel industry which looks at gaining insight into what companies are doing responsibly, how they are measuring the impact and what they hope to do moving forward.

This research ties in with World Responsible Tourism Day (WRTD), now the largest day of responsible tourism action in the world and focusing on responsible tourism efforts in the travel industry.

All research sessions in the Press Conference Theatre are available to all delegates.

As part of WTM London’s drive to hone the relevance of sessions, with a greater focus on the regions represented at the show, area-specific topics will be covered within the regional Inspiration Zones.

WTM London, WTM Portfolio Press & PR Lead, Julia Newbound, said: “Research is a crucial component of the WTM London seminar experience, with past sessions consistently standing-room-only. Companies big and small want to ensure they are ahead of the game, so attending these sessions to find out the latest research, trends and data is a great way to make sure they are not left behind.

“We have a mix of global research alongside dedicated country-focused sessions in our regional Inspiration Zones. These sessions will offer delegates even more ideas to implement in their businesses, further demonstrating that Ideas Arrive at WTM London.”

About World Travel Market

World Travel Market (WTM) portfolio comprises eight leading B2B events across four continents, generating more than $7 billion of industry deals. The events are:

WTM London, the leading global event for the travel industry, is the must-attend three-day exhibition for the worldwide travel and tourism industry. About 50,000 senior travel industry professionals, government ministers and international media visit ExCeL London every November, generating about £3.4 billion in travel industry contracts.

Next event: Monday 4 – Wednesday 6 November 2019 – London #IdeasArriveHere

About Reed Exhibitions

Reed Exhibitions is the world’s leading events business, enhancing the power of face-to-face through data and digital tools at more than 500 events a year, in more than 43 countries, attracting more than seven million participants. Reed’s events are held in the Americas, Europe, Asia Pacific and Africa and organised by 41 fully staffed offices. Reed Exhibitions serves 43 industry sectors with trade and consumer events. It is part of RELX Group plc, a world-leading provider of information solutions for professional customers across industries.

About Reed Travel Exhibitions

Reed Travel Exhibitions is the world’s leading travel and tourism event’s organiser with a growing portfolio of more than 22 international travel and tourism trade events in Europe, the Americas, Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Our events are market leaders in their sectors, whether they are global and regional leisure travel trade events, or specialist events for meetings, incentives, conference, events (MICE) industry, business travel, luxury travel, travel technology as well as golf, spa and ski travel. We have more than 35 years’ experience in organising world-leading travel exhibitions.

MEDIA CONTACTS:

Julia Newbound – WTM Portfolio Press & PR Lead

E: [email protected]

T: +44 (0)20 8910 7056 / M: +44 (0)7775 036 858

Nicole Smart – WTM Portfolio PR & Events Consultant

E: [email protected]

T: +44 (0)20 8910 7032/ M: +44 (0)79 1955 5510

Seychelles Tourism Board led Local Trade Partners on Réunion Roadshow

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Seychelles Tourism Board (STB) and its local partners embarked on a roadshow in Réunion, Saint -Gilles- Les Bains from September 16, 2019 to September 17, 2019.

The event was organised by the STB team in Reunion who prepared presentations and workshops so that they could equip Réunion Travel Trade professionals with the tools to further boost the wave of Réunion Holiday makers in Seychelles. These sessions attracted over 40 agents.

The Réunion roadshow saw participation from local partners comprising of 7° degrees South, Mason’s Travel, Seychelles European Reservation, Summer Rain Tours, Avani Seychelles Barbarons Resort & Spa and Patatran Hotel.

The STB team consisted of Mrs. Bernadette Willemin, Director Regional Europe and Ms. Bernadette Honore, Senior Marketing Executive from the STB Réunion office.

Whilst the first session consisted of presentations showing travel trade front liners staff across Réunion about what the Seychelles has to offer its visitors, the second session focused on training the Réunion Travel Trade professionals specialising in group business. 

This destination and product training initiative provided the professionals with a better understanding about the Seychelles products so that they have enough information to encourage travellers to visit Seychelles.

The STB team also received the support of the Reunion airline partner Air Austral- that provides direct connectivity to the Seychelles- as they delivered product knowledge presentations.

Commenting on the Réunion Road show, Mrs Bernadette Willemin, Director Regional Europe, stated the STB’s commitment to increase visibility and knowledge of the product to all its partners.

“Destination and product trainings are of utmost importance in this competitive tourism world and our role as a marketing tourism professionals specialist is to ensure that the travel trade professionals we interact with to sell Seychelles are well versed with our products and confident to sell our destination” said Bernadette Willemin.

Mrs. Willemin emphasised that the product-focussed training sessions are a success with the help of the trade from Seychelles.

She added, “The STB with the collaboration of its partners will continue to organise such activity on the market making sure that our Reunionais partners have all the knowledge to attend to the clients’ requests and convert them into sales”.   

 The training sessions closed with Business-to-Business meetings, where the participants had the opportunity to hold discussions with local Trade partners and Reunion Travel Trade professionals.

Members of the trade present commented unanimously that the roadshow organised by the STB team in Reunion was very successful.

They stated that the local workshop sessions were well structured and gave them an opportunity to meet various partners from different tourism fields.

MEDIA CONTACT: STB News Bureau, Tel: +248 4 671 354 / +248 4 671 313, [email protected]  www.seychelles.travel

Nike, UBS, SMG and … superheroes all power IMEX America education program

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Experts from UBS, Nike and SMG are among the speakers at IMEX America this year. Taking place September 10 – 12, IMEX America has a firm focus on education with more than 180 learning sessions – all free of charge – over the entire show for meeting and events professionals at all levels. Show organizers have also increased the capacity of the show’s education theater, the Inspiration Hub sponsored by Maritz Global Events, by 12 per cent to allow more people to benefit from its in-demand program.

Ron Renee Roley, board member LGBT Meeting Professionals Association and Senior Event Manager for Global Events at Nike, discusses diversity in Creating environments of acceptance: gender expression in the workplace and beyond. As a champion for trans workers’ rights, gender neutral bathrooms, safe travel for trans employees, they will share personal experiences and advise attendees on how to develop an understanding of gender expression.

Women and risk: rewriting the rules sees Dr. Mara Catherine Harvey from UBS Switzerland share steps on addressing economic gender equality. Dr Harvey, also the keynote at She Means Business conference, is committed to advancing equality in finance and her session sheds light on tackling pay gaps both now and in the future.

Diversity and inclusion is the focus of sessions by Katie Wells from SMG – she will share examples from her company culture to show how inclusion can benefit businesses. Her session, Being who you are is an advantage in the workplace, will show how there is a measurable, positive impact on a company’s performance and business results when an open and collaborative culture exists.

‘Stop, stare and say wow’ – learning opportunities to power the imagination

Collaboration is one of three ‘pillars’ of Imagination, IMEX’s Talking Point for this year, and many education sessions at the show explore this in more detail. Take The science behind imaginative events by EventMB.com. As research partners on this year’s IMEX industry research report, EventMB.com will present findings and case studies from their report into some of the most imaginative events in the industry. Julius Solaris’ sessions will show how to translate inspiration into business action and use imagination to elevate performance, both professionally and personally.

Founder of the Event Design Collective, Roel Frissen, will show how the event model canvas enables planners to collaboratively design innovative events in an MPI education session #EventCanvas: your map to extraordinary meetings.

Make delegates ‘stop, stare and say wow’ is the aim of Do you remember when? Emma Pitts, Founder and CEO of PullSpark, draws upon her experience in live events and production to share tips on how to captivate an audience and create a truly memorable event.

Sustainability superheroes make a stand

Various facets of sustainability, a core consideration for many event professionals, are covered in multiple sessions including one that enlists the help of superheroes! Greening the events industry: sustainability superheroes assemble! is a panel of industry-leading professionals – including IMEX’s own COO Nalan Emre – discussing how to work together to imagine new initiatives, minimize waste and how this feeds into designing a better event experience.

Next-level sustainability – Global Climate Action Summit case study is a deep dive into the sustainability strategy of the Global Climate Action Summit, winner of the IMEX-EIC Innovation in Sustainability Award at IMEX in Frankfurt this year. Jaime Nack, President of Three Squares Inc, reviews its key impact areas and how it became the first event to achieve third party certification to ISO 20121.

Mariela McIlwraith from EIC and Guy Bigwood from Global Destinations Sustainability Index introduce the UN Sustainable Development Goals in Events as conservers, creators and catalysts for the UN Sustainable Development Goals. They’ll share case studies of events which are creating positive change in communities and prompting participants to take action.

Finally, technology continues to feature highly with the latest in gamification, apps, AR and cyber security all explored in detail. Speaker Tim Altbaum, CEO of Vario, believes the next five years will see the fastest growth ever in event technology. His session Mixed reality and event technology trends focuses on how advances in AR/VR and AI will change event environments and the resulting impact on attendees.

Carina Bauer, CEO of the IMEX Group, explains: “Beginning with Smart Monday, powered by MPI, and also running throughout the three days of the show, education is a firm focus for IMEX America. We recognize that, although event planners need to remain up to date on the latest issues and trends, it can sometime be a challenge to carve out time for professional development in between their business appointments. Our sessions – all free of charge – are offered in a variety of learning formats and cover 10 tracks including business skills, trends and research, creative learning, technology and marketing. We and our partners craft ‘something for everyone’ so they can hit that perfect balance between business, networking and inspiration.”

The IMEX America education program is now live. IMEX America takes place September 10 – 12, 2019, with Smart Monday, powered by MPI on September 9. Registration for the show is free of charge and open to all who work in the meetings, events and incentive travel industry.

IMEX America, the heartbeat of the global business events community, will take place September 10 – 12 at the Sands® Expo and Convention Center at The Venetian®| The Palazzo® in Las Vegas, preceded by Smart Monday, powered by MPI, on September 9.

Media Contacts:

Emma Blake (UK): [email protected]  

Norman Birnbach (US): [email protected]    

IMEX exhibitors invited to make Sustainable Exhibiting Pledge

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IMEX in Frankfurt has invited exhibitors at this year’s show (21 -23 May) to make a Sustainable Exhibiting Pledge as it continues to increase its commitment to demonstrating and leading through best practice in sustainability.

Carina Bauer, CEO of the IMEX Group, said: “Our approach to sustainability is to lead by example, to encourage others to aim higher and to shine a spotlight on key industry campaigns. This year I’m inviting exhibitors to make a sustainable exhibiting pledge, to implement three simple green initiatives to help reduce their environmental impact at the show. A list of ideas on how to do this features in our IMEX in Frankfurt 2019 Sustainable Exhibiting Guide.”

In January the IMEX Group highlighted its commitment by making sustainability the third ‘pillar’ of this year’s IMEX Talking Point “Imagination.”

Carina Bauer explained: “We’re asking everyone in the global meetings industry to imagine a new beginning: to ask what if we all really committed to cutting down waste?

“We’ve continued to improve our own sustainability performance at both of our shows each year and we’re proud to say that our Frankfurt show is now 100 per cent hydro-powered. Thanks to our waste donation program plus the responsible recycling systems at Messe Frankfurt, we now send zero waste to landfill. This is virtually unheard of in the exhibition business!

“Our work to reduce and recycle more waste generated by both exhibitors and visitors is explained in our first ever IMEX in Frankfurt sustainability report which joins our annual IMEX America sustainability report.”

In line with its determination to lead the industry forward, IMEX was a launch partner when the Events Industry Council introduced its Principles of Sustainable Events in January after hosting two forums at IMEX in Frankfurt and IMEX America in 2018 when these principles were formulated.

A further element of its commitment to leading the industry, the IMEX team believes in sharing what it knows and has learned through experience. At IMEX in Frankfurt, learning about sustainability will feature prominently throughout the show. Starting on EduMonday, 20 May, there will be more than 20 opportunities to learn about sustainability among the 250 plus sessions in the extensive education program at the Inspiration Hub. What’s more, the first ever Sustainability Policy Round table, supported by Edmonton, will bring together industry leaders and experts to share insights at the InterContinental Frankfurt on 21 May.

Furthermore, in partnership with the Events Industry Council (EIC), IMEX will salute an organization making a significant commitment to reducing its environmental impact by announcing the winner of the IMEX-EIC Innovation in Sustainability Award at the IMEX Gala Dinner on 22 May.

Carina Bauer, CEO of the IMEX Group, says: “At both shows we continue to work closely with our partners including Meet Green, EIC, The Venetian®| The Palazzo® and the Sands Expo®, Messe Frankfurt and GES. We are wholeheartedly committed to providing education, inspiration and leadership on sustainability issues. The business events industry still has a long way to go before thinking green is the first thought, not the last.”

Travel News | eTurboNews

Air Seychelles gets ready for delivery of their first Airbus A320NEO

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Air Seychelles has over the past few months started to implement its training calendar in preparation for the delivery of the A320neo set for July 2019.

Last week, key staff members from the Technical Operations and Project Management including the Flight Operations team, as well as representatives from the Seychelles Civil Aviation Authority, attended the A320neo general familiarization training held in-house at the Air Seychelles head office in Pointe Larue.

The training held over four days, delivered by Mr. Michael Mahn, an experienced engineer from Airbus, provided the participants a general overview of the airframe that is the whole mechanical structure of the new aircraft. Currently another batch of staff members from similar areas within the business are also taking part in the training which commenced on Monday, April 15, and lasted until Thursday, April 18, 2019.

During the month of February, the Airbus Hamburg Training Centre welcomed the first group of Air Seychelles aircraft engineers as part of its comprehensive A320neo training program. The agenda composed of both theory and on-the-job experience provided the technical operations team further knowledge on how to conduct maintenance on the A320neo besides having the chance to view the Airbus assembly line.

Held from Monday, February 18, until Wednesday, February 27, the sessions in Hamburg were attended by engineers Clyne De -Letourdis, David Saminaden, and Denys Assan.

In addition to that, as of Tuesday, February 5, until Thursday, February 7, Manager of Cabin Safety Standards, Magdalena Hubert, and Manager for Cabin Safety Training Programs, Dereck Charlette, also had the chance to participate in the Airbus A320neo safety training held at the Airbus Training Centre Europe in Toulouse.

The training will proceed over the next upcoming months as part of the entry into service program of the new Air Seychelles A320neo aircraft.

The Seychelles Civil Aviation Authority in the meantime is progressing the type approval of this new aircraft which had not been registered in the Seychelles before and, therefore, requires additional regulatory approvals and licensing measures.

Travel News | eTurboNews