Johannesburg wants to host more conventions

The city, which hosts about 10 conventions a year, is far behind its competitors such as Sao Paulo, Brazil, which plays host to about 90 big conferences a year.

"We are developing a new focused strategy and are now working more closely with the City of Johannesburg's political and administrative bodies. The new bid fund will go a long way to making the city more attractive to conference organisers," Mangcu said.

Many cities across the world use additional resources to sweeten the deal for conference organisers. For example, Sydney may add the use of its famous Opera House to potential organisers of a conference when bidding for its business.

South Africa officially launched the National Convention Bureau in February to help the country play "catch up" in the lucrative conference hosting arena and help cities secure bids for events in an integrated way.

Mangcu called for cities in South Africa to co-operate with each other when bidding for certain conferences. "We shouldn't be competing for conferences but working together to get conferences suited for each city."

Johannesburg has failed in the past to pique the interest of a few big conferences organisers, with Cape Town and Durban beating it to the post. But the city has now secured three major summits next year, including the C40 summit on climate change, the One Young World Summit, and the annual meeting of the Board of Directors of the Metropolis organisation.

Paul Bannister, founder of consultancy Ignite and the Welcome Tourism campaign, said due to crime there was still hesitancy over attending conferences in Johannesburg.

While business tourism is one of Johannesburg's main concerns, the city is also working at promoting itself as a leisure destination, in the hope of enticing visitors to other parts of the city. To this end it has introduced a new booking portal, which allows visitors to book special packages around events.

Source: Business Day via I-Net Bridge.