Conference & Meetings World – March 1st, 2016 – Japan has won its bid to host the 49th Annual Meeting and General Assembly of the International Association of Professional Congress Organisers (IAPCO) in 2018.
Events around the meetings will take place in two Japanese cities: the Annual Meeting and General Assembly will convene in Tokyo, following council meetings in Osaka.
IAPCO made the announcement during its recent Annual Meeting held in Cape Town, South Africa.
IAPCO says it has seen significant growth in membership from the Asian region, and in 2013 a Japanese member was elected to the council for the first time in 20 years.
Tokyo 2018 will be the first time in 22 years that the IAPCO meeting will have returned to Asia, (since Bali, Indonesia, in 1996). It will be the second time Japan has hosted the event (it held the meeting in Chiba in 1993).
The Japanese bid was organised by three IAPCO members – Congress Corporation, Japan Convention Services and Convention Linkage – with support from the national and local governments, including the Japan National Tourism Organisation, the Japan Tourism Agency, the Tokyo Convention & Visitors Bureau and the Osaka Convention & Tourism Bureau.
IAPCO was founded in 1968, is registered in Switzerland and represents more than 116 professional organisers, meeting planners and managers of international and national congresses, conventions and special events from 41 countries. IAPCO members organise in excess of 8,500 meetings annually, totalling some 3.16m delegates.