In a risk planning exercise for UBM senior management a few years ago, Paul Woodward writes, Simon Foster recalls they were asked to come up with an imaginary scenario which would stop the global exhibition industry in its tracks. Taking into account the experience of the Icelandic volcano ash cloud of 2011 and SARS two years later, they decided that a global pandemic which brought airline travel to a complete stop would do it. “They weren’t terribly serious in proposing this and even the professional running the meeting, said to us ‘I think you’re being a bit outrageous’,” Foster recalls.
Not as outrageous as they imagined unfortunately and, although travel is resuming in places, it remains heavily disrupted around the world. This is undoubtedly continuing to have a significant impact on the recovery of exhibition businesses. Some markets remain much more seriously affected, while others have what look like much better plans to exit a world of lockdowns, quarantines, and closed borders.
Just this week AUMA, the German exhibition industry association, noted that “around 60% of the approximately 180,000 exhibitors each year [at German fairs] come from abroad, a third of them from countries outside Europe”. Some 30% of the visitors to those fairs also come from outside Germany. “Open borders and the smoothest possible international travel are therefore essential for German trade fairs,” AUMA went on to say. The fact that they are not open, that international travel remains anything but smooth and looks set to stay that way for some time means that jwc’s Global Industry Performance Review predicts that Germany will only be back at 75% of pre-pandemic business levels by 2023. The successful launch of the EU Digital Covid Certificate will certainly have been welcomed as a step in the right direction as the rest of the EU is a crucial source market for Germany.
Some of the largest markets where international business is the ‘icing on the cake’…