President of Istanbul Chamber of Commerce (ITO) and Istanbul Convention and Visitors Bureau (ICVB), Sekib Avdagic said that Istanbul has risen among the world congress cities and has shown its best performance in the last 8 years.
ICVB announced that Istanbul hosted 72 congresses with participant numbers ranging from 300 to 25 thousand in 2023. Istanbul ranked 16th in Europe and 21st in the world.
In 2023, Paris ranked first in the world by hosting 156 congresses, followed by Singapore with 152 congresses and Lisbon with 151 congresses.
The number of congresses in Istanbul increased by 14 in 2023 compared to the previous year.
On the other hand, according to the data of the International Congress and Meetings Association (ICCA), Istanbul jumped 4 places in Europe and 2 places in the world in the world congress cities ranking last year.
Making a statement to the AA correspondent, ITO and ICVB President Avdagic pointed out that Istanbul continues its rise in the global tourism and congress sectors at full speed, and said that the investments and projects made by ITO and ICVB in the last 5 years, focusing on congress tourism, have yielded successful results.
Noting that Istanbul has gradually increased its place in international rankings and statistics specifically for congress tourism, Avdagic said, “Istanbul has risen step by step among the world congress cities and showed its best performance in the last 8 years in 2023. It is an honor to contribute to this as ICVB. Our ultimate goal is to be among the top 10 cities with the most congresses in the world, as we achieved between 2011 and 2015.”
Sharing the data in the ICCA system, which keeps statistics of congresses held in all destinations in the world, Avdagic informed that 19 international congresses with the number of participants between 250 and 7 thousand will be held in Istanbul in 2024.
Avdagic pointed out that ICVB directly supports 6 international congresses, in which a total of 12 thousand 800 people will participate, and stated that ICVB has 13 international congresses for which it is working on candidates to be included in Istanbul in 2025 and beyond.
Some international congresses to be held in Istanbul:
Many international congresses will be held in Istanbul, with the participation of more than 24 thousand “congress tourists”.
Among the prominent congresses, in May, the International Conference on Automatic Face and Gesture Recognition (FG 20) and the 47th Congress of the European Lymphology Society; in June, the International Plastination Conference, World Federation of Societies of Biological Psychiatry Congress (WFSBP), FDI Annual World Dental Congress, International Federation of Landscape Architects World Congress (IFLA), and Better Cotton Conference; in July, the Airport Council International Europe General Assembly, Congress, and Exhibition; in September, the International Society for Quality in Health Care Conference (ISQUA), International Society of Transport Aircraft Trading EMEA Conference (ISTAT), International Transplantation Society Congress (TTS), IPPE Annual Political Economy Conference; in October, the International Rubber Conference (IRC); and in November, the International Society of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy Congress (ISC) are highlighted.
Source: AA / Prepared by Irem Yildiz