Brazil won the bid to host the World Congress of Chambers of Commerce, an international event dedicated to leaders and executives of chambers of commerce from around the world. The 11th edition of the international event will take place in Rio de Janeiro in 2019.
The capital of the Brazilian state had cities like Bogotá (Colombia) and Orlando (United States) among its competitors and was declared the winner of the bid to host the event on December 5 by the World Chambers Federation (WCF). This is the first time the Congress will be held in a South American city.
The event will have the theme Creating a Shared Future. The city of Rio also plans a series of parallel events to be organized by the different Chambers of Commerce in Brazil in their respective regions.
Business and Events
The efforts to bring the event to Brazil were supported by the Brazilian Institute of Tourism (Embratur). The corporate events segment, commonly referred to as MICE (an acronym for Meetings, Incentives, Congresses and Events), is the second largest contributor to the flow of international visitors to Brazil, surpassed only by Leisure.
Activities related to MICE grew by 7.8% in Brazil compared to the same period the previous year, according to the Brazilian Association of Corporate Travel Agencies (Abracorp).
“Our country has been a strong supporter of city bids for international events since 2004, and the effort has placed us in a position of global leadership. Currently, we are one of the leading countries in the world in terms of hosting MICE initiatives,” said Gilson Lira, director of Competitive Intelligence and Tourism Promotion at Embratur.
Brazil leads South America in the MICE segment and is only surpassed by the United States in the Americas, according to data from the International Congress and Convention Association (ICCA).