Filling Up India's Conventions Calendar

The domestic MICE industry looks to grow its share to at least 2 per cent of the global pie

- Chitra Narayanan

The Hannover exhibition center in Germany, one of the largest convention centers in the world, is spread across 5,54,000 sq meters. Stuttgart, Berlin, Dusseldorf, all have fairly massive meeting spaces too.

By contrast, if you add up all the convention centers in India, the total to just 5,00,000 sq meters of space. Although the MICE (Meetings, Incentives, Conferences, Exhibitions) business in India is pegged at 25,000 crore and growing at 8 percent, year on year, it has a minuscule 0.5 percent share of the global industry, which is estimated to be around $808 billion (5,814,570 crore). The US and Germany lead in MICE, while India trails at 28th place — even tiny Thailand is ahead of us.

However, delegates and speakers at the 12th Conventions India Conclave held recently in Kochi were hopeful that with more than 12 new venues coming up in India, things could change.

As Chander Mansharamani, Vice-Chairman of India Conventions Promotion Bureau, a body that tries to attract more events to India, pointed out, “Once those come up in the next couple of years, MICE space in India could cross 15,00,000 sq meters.”

The big debate at the CIC event was how to rev up the growth of MICE and take India’s share to at least 2 percent of the global industry pie.

“For that, the entire ecosystem — from convention center builder to hoteliers to event planners right down to flower vendors — has to chip in and pitch collectively,” said Suman Billa, joint secretary, Ministry of Tourism. But first, do we need world-class convention centers?

Exciting new venues