MESSE Berlin, one of the world’s leading trade fair companies, announced that it will be organising the inaugural ITB India in 2020.
The three-day, business-to-business travel trade show and convention will take place at the Bombay Exhibition Centre in Mumbai, India, from April 15 to 17. The show will bring together key travel industry leaders and buyers from cities across India, and international exhibitors from the Mice, leisure and corporate sectors. ITB India will also have a hosted buyers’ programme that will cater to buyers from first, second, and third tier cities in India. The Indian travel industry is expected to be valued at $56,000,000,000 by 2020 with UNTWO, the World Tourism Organization, predicting that there will 50 million outbound travellers by then. ITB India represents a major opportunity for National Tourism Organisations (NTOs), travel, and hospitality companies to be part of this dramatically expanding market opportunity. “In recent years, we have given the ITB brand an increasingly international dimension,” said Dr Christian Göke, chief executive officer of Messe Berlin. “From a global and regional perspective, India is a vast source market for the travel industry with a huge growth potential. We are delighted that ITB India will in future complement the trio of ITB Berlin, ITB Asia and ITB China, making it a quartet and strengthening the global ITB brand.” India’s economic growth means that its citizens are earning more disposable income to spend on travel. India’s outbound travel expenditure increased 7 per cent on average year-on-year between 2006 and 2016 and saw an even higher growth rate of 8.5 per cent in travel expenditure from 2015 to 2016. This rate was considerably higher than growth rates seen by other major countries including China, Indonesia, and Brazil for the same period. “Having successfully run eleven editions of ITB Asia, it is logical for us to progress to the next frontier of travel in Asia. India represents an extremely promising market with a growing purchasing power among travellers from the region. We are optimistic that ITB India will be a prominent platform for attendees from the MICE, leisure and corporate sectors to come together to further grow the Indian travel market,” said Katrina Leung, Managing Director of Messe Berlin (Singapore), the organiser of ITB India.