Kigali and Rwanda both ranked third in ICCA 2016 performance barometer

NEW ICCA INDEX CONFIRMS RISE TO THIRD POSITION IN AFRICA FOR BOTH KIGALI AND RWANDA

(Posted 10th May 2017)

ICCA has now officially confirmed, after the news was broken here two days ago, that Rwanda’s position as an African MICE powerhouse has gone up to third, only beaten by South Africa and Morocco.
The city of Kigali too has reached this ranking, with only Marrakech and Cape Town ahead of them in the African rankings.
Given that Rwanda in 2013 was in 21st position in Africa, has the formation of the Rwanda Convention Bureau in 2014 led to a constant rise through the ranks. In 2014 was Rwanda already in 13th position, in 2015 this rose to number 7 in Africa and now, in the latest ICCA Index has the Land of a Thousand Hills reached a podium position.
The following are the top ten countries and conference cities in Africa:

1. South Africa
2. Morocco
3. Rwanda
4. Egypt
5. Kenya
6. Ghana
7. Ethiopia
8. Nigeria
9. Tanzania
10. Uganda

1. Cape Town
2. Marrakech
3. Kigali
4. Durban
5. Johannesburg
6. Nairobi
7. Addis Ababa
8. Stellenbosch
9. Accra
10. Cairo

Here did notably Kampala come in 11th position giving some hope that when the Serena Conference Centre has undergone complete refurbishment by 2018 a higher position will be within reach.

However not one African country or city make it into the global top 20 though as the ICCA, short for the International Conference and Conventions Association rankings confirm.

2016 City rankings: Paris reclaims the top spot
Paris, number one in 2014, takes over first place again with 196 meetings in 2016 – one more meeting than last year’s number one Berlin. Even though the order is quite different, this year’s top 5 cities were also represented in last year’s top 5. Vienna climbs 2 places to second and Barcelona remains third. Berlin drops from first to fourth place and London remains fifth. Singapore is the first Asian city jumping one place from seventh to sixth. Madrid drop 2 places from a shared fifth in 2015 to a shared seventh in 2016. Newcomers in the top 10 compared to last year are Amsterdam, twelfth last year and now sharing seventh place with Madrid, and Seoul jumping from 13th to tenth. Like last year, Lisbon is ninth.

Table 1: Top 20 city ranking by number of meetings organised in 2016

2016 Country rankings: France climbs one place
The top 10 is made up of the same countries as last year, with some minor shift and one newcomer on a shared tenth place. U.S.A. remains number one with 934 meetings in 2016; 9 more than in 2015. Germany remains second and The United Kingdom remains third. France and Spain swap places: France is now fourth and Spain fifth. Italy and Japan remain sixth and seventh, while Japan now shares seventh place with China-P.R., which is climbing one place. The Netherlands drops one place form shared eighth to ninth and Canada remains tenth but is now joined on tenth place by Portugal, which was twelfth last year.

Table 2: Top 20 country ranking by number of meetings organised in 2016

(Source ICCA)

https://atcnews.org/2017/05/08/rwanda-climbs-to-third-rank-as-african-mice-destination/