BRIDGETOWN, Barbados – The Caribbean placed special attention on the German market at a specially organised event at the world’s leading travel and tourism trade fair, ITB Berlin 2006, held March 8 – 12 in Berlin, Germany.
The Caribbean Tourism Organization (CTO) and Messe Berlin, the trade fair organisers, have joined forces to present the 7th Annual Karibik Forum, a lively and informative presentation and debate for the European travel trade press and other European and Caribbean delegates to ITB. It will be held from 1:00 p.m. on Friday 10th March 2005 at the International Congress Centre.
The forum¸ entitled “Generating New Business from the German Market”, features a line up of key speakers from different sectors of the market who will focus on travel trends and outlooks for the German market and German speaking countries; booking long haul holidays on line; the use of websites as a tool to reach the German markets; the opportunities for special interest holidays; and how the smaller Caribbean countries can benefit from partnerships with high quality specialist operators.
” Germany is the world’s largest outbound tourism market, although it currently sends only around half a million tourists to the Caribbean. It is therefore a key source market from Europe which provides strong growth potential,” said Julia Hendry, CTO’s director of marketing in Europe.
“With this in mind, this years’ Karibik Forum is a must for visiting delegations,” she stated ahead of the opening of ITB.
The forum will be moderated by Matthias Schulz, the director of international markets for NiedeckenMedien, publisher of Germany’s leading travel magazines, including FVW International.
Key Speakers include Werner Sülberg, the vice president of corporate development and market research for REWE, the fourth largest tourism group in Europe; Michael Kalt, the chief financial officer of traveltainment AG, an IT company who develops software solutions for online travel sales; Urs Sander, the managing director of the niche tour operator fts-travel.
The Caribbean Tourism Organisation has put together a full calendar of meetings together, bringing together the public and private sectors from all over Europe. As it has done in the past, CTO has also designed and decorated a Caribbean Village at which nearly 30 member countries will exhibit alongside their private sector partners.
ITB Berlin, which celebrates its 40th year this year, is expected to attract more than 10,500 exhibitors from 180 countries exhibitors.
