Pacific Tourism Exchange Seller Registrations Open
Over 80 tourism buyers and sellers are expected to participate at the 2nd South Pacific Tourism Exchange (SPTE) in Australia organised by the South Pacific Tourism Organisation.
The event will be held on June 19 and 20 at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre in Melbourne, Australia.
Sellers are made up of tourism operators in the South Pacific that will sell their products and services at the two-day event.
SPTO chief executive Ilisoni Vuidreketi said the interest shown by the regions private sector was very positive and the event is gearing up to be another successful event.
“We sent out expressions of interest to our 16 Pacific Island member countries including Fiji, to gauge the participation at this year’s event,” he said.
“The response from the tourism private sector has been very overwhelming and we are optimistic of hosting a successful SPTE 2015.”
The SPTE 2015 is targeting 80 international buyers to meet and network with 80 tourism operators.
These are the national tourism offices, ITOs, regional airlines, hotel operators, tour and excursion operators from the South Pacific Tourism Organisation’s (SPTO).
Because of the high demand from both Buyers and Sellers after last year’s successful inaugural event in Auckland, the organisers have decided to increase the participation by 30 extra places compared to 50 last year.
The SPTO has recently just launched the SPTO private sector membership which is available to all tourism operators from the region as well as international stakeholders.
“We are also encouraging the private sector to sign up to the SPTO as a member to reap the benefits the SPTO can provide for your business at all the international tourism and trade shows that we attend overseas,” Mr Vuidreketi said.
| Sun INTERVIEW with Alisi Lutu, SPTO Marketing Manager |
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| How has the previous event been? The SPTE has formed out of the previous Bula Fiji Tourism Exchange which use to be held in Fiji. Sellers from the Pacific Region were also included in that. After it ended in 2012, there was no platform for the Pacific Nations to show case their products to the travel agents. So SPTO, with the corporation of our 16 Pacific Island members, held the first event in Auckland last year in May. From there we had about 50 buyers and sellers. We were really testing the waters and after the event happened, we saw the demand from the International sellers – travel agents wanting to know more about the Pacific Islands and what were on offer. Therefore, this year we have tried to accommodate more buyers as well as allowing more sellers from the Pacific to showcase their products. The biggest challenge for Fiji’s tourism market?? |
Feedback: rachael.nath@fijisun.com.fj
