£4.6 Million Boost for Edinburgh Economy

Online, July 6, 2010 (Newswire.com) - The latest data from the ECB means the body responsible for promoting the city as a world class business tourism destination is on track to achieve its target of helping attract conferences and meetings to Edinburgh worth £75.7million to the local economy.

Sue Stuart, Chief Executive of ECB, said:" In the past month we have worked hard to help confirm sixteen new events that will be hosted by Edinburgh. They will deliver £4.646million of economic value bringing our total value of events in Edinburgh confirmed during the first quarter of this year to £20.8 million."

She added: "Even in these still uncertain economic times of cutbacks and austerity Edinburgh is still proving to be a high quality, value for money location that is popular with event organisers."

The sixteen new Edinburgh events that were confirmed during June will bring 3,270 high spending business delegates to the city over the next two years.

They range in topics from neuroinformatics, stem cell and regenerative medicine to credit scoring.

Editors Notes

- ECB helped win 257 conferences in Edinburgh during 2009/10 worth £74.2 million to the economy.
- Edinburgh is the most popular UK city after London for hosting international association meetings and is the 36th most popular business tourism destination in the world.
- In order to count towards ICCA ranking an event must rotate its location between a minimum of two countries and have at least 50 (international) delegates.
- The annual total value of Edinburgh's business tourism is estimated at almost £300 million.
- The Edinburgh Ambassadors Programme matches recognised leaders in the city's many areas of academic and commercial excellence with the professional marketing support of ECB staff who together work as a team to help them bring their international association's conference to Edinburgh. Since 1996 the programme has helped bring more than 210 major events, worth almost £100 million, to the city.
- Edinburgh is a founder member of the international www.bestcities.net strategic alliance, which aims to guarantee the meetings industry the world's best service experience in each of the member cities (Cape Town, Copenhagen, Dubai, Edinburgh, Melbourne, San Juan, Singapore, Vancouver).
- To learn more about ECB visit www.conventionedinburgh.com