Events campus hails new wins

Conference bookings worth an estimated £168 million to the Scottish economy have been secured by the Scottish Event Campus (SEC) in Glasgow since the start of the year, despite the impact of Covid-19.

A number of major international and UK conferences have been won since the end of last year and will take place between 2021 and 2026. They range in size from 300 to 8,500 delegates and include events for major organisations including the Royal College of Nursing. Three new conferences have been secured in the last two weeks alone.

In total, the business secured amounts to 189,944 participant days for the city.

Kathleen Warden, director of conference sales at the SEC, said: “Whilst this has been a challenging time as we work with clients around the world to reschedule as many events as possible affected by Covid-19, we are continuing to strengthen the business pipeline for years to come.

“These wins are testament to the relentless teamwork with our key city partners and academic community and demonstrate the ongoing need for people to attend events in person. What’s more, securing new dates for COP26 in 2021 provides a welcome boost for the city as we move forward and highlights the importance of conferences in driving social and economic progress.”

Lars Muckli, professor of visual and cognitive neurosciences at the University of Glasgow who has helped attract the annual Organization of Human Brain Mapping (OHBM) meeting in Glasgow in 2022, said the acaademic standing of the city was a key factor.

“This is the second time that the meeting has come to the UK in 27 years and in that time, the expertise in brain imaging in Glasgow has grown significantly. This has positioned Glasgow as a leading hub in the brain imaging field and has helped us to win the conference,” he said.