Tours make attractive add-ons for MICE business

[Photo provided to chinadaily.com.cn]

Beijing will focus on developing meeting, incentive, conference and exhibition (MICE) tours as well as those offering traditional Chinese medicine experiences, according to the Beijing High-End Tourism and Meetings Industry Alliance.

“MICE tourism has become an important approach to speed up the process for Beijing to evolve into an international exchange center,” says Wang Yue, vice-chairwoman of the Beijing Municipal Commission of Tourism Development.

The capital city’s meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions industry has boomed in the past decade with support from the government and constant exploration of new approaches and directions by leading industry players.

Data from the International Congress and Convention Association show that Beijing hosted 104 international conferences in 2014, ranking second in Asia and first in China.

The capital city has held a total of 519 international meetings and received more than 200,000 participants.

“(Those meetings) have become a key factor in the growth of the high-end inbound tourism market,” Wang explains.

The city is expected to see 281 million tourists this year, according to this year’s annual report on tourism development by the Beijing Tourism Society, a non-governmental academic organization.

To further promote such upgrading, Wang said there should be more tourism packages and opportunities of various kinds, and new MICE venues and resources should be developed.

Wang believed that more customized tours are needed to satisfy the demand of high-end tourists.

Beijing has launched seven traditional Chinese medicine tours, for both Chinese and foreign visitors, since 2011. At the moment, there are 29 TCM tourism facilities in Beijing.