Pictured above: Tourism Minister John Penrose with
VisitBirmingham's Lonely Planet iPhone app which helps visitors
interactively explore the city
Senior figures from Birmingham's tourism community today met
with Tourism Minister John Penrose, to discuss the city's visitor
economy and the contribution it makes to the UK's tourism offer. As
a leading events and conferencing destination, Birmingham is a key
driver of the UK's events industry contributing more than
£6billion[1] per annum and generating and 100,000 jobs
[2].
Marketing Birmingham, which operates Birmingham's business and
leisure tourism campaigns, Meet Birmingham and Visit Birmingham,
hosted a roundtable discussion for the Minister and a
representative group from the city's visitor economy as part of a
UK fact finding tour ahead of the Government's launch of a national
tourism strategy expected later this month.
Neil Rami, Chief Executive of Marketing Birmingham, said:
"In the week that both Visit Britain and Visit England announced
cuts to their staffing levels and overseas presence, the importance
of the contribution Birmingham can make to the national visitor
economy has been brought into sharp focus."
"Birmingham's visitor and events offer is a key driver of the
local and national tourism economy and contributes significantly to
the UK's GDP. Working with partners across the public and private
sectors has allowed us to develop a strategy that works for the
city and we are keen to work with the Minister to build on this
success".
The city's latest strategy to capitalise on its events and
conferencing credentials to attract international visitors and
further investment was also a key part of today's discussions. The
Minister lauded Marketing Birmingham's drive to align its tourism
strategies with its inward investment plans. Designed to attract
investment and create jobs, the plans were seen as a major step
forward and an example of how the public and private sector can
work together to promote economic growth in UK cities.
Rami added:
"Placing the promotion of the city as a tourism and investor
destination within one organisation has allowed Marketing
Birmingham to align its strategy and resources to effectively sell
the city at home and abroad.
"For example , bringing together one of the city's investment
priorities, low carbon, with our conferencing offer has already
secured a global solar power conference for the city. It will
ensure key industry figures from across the globe visit Birmingham
and understand the investment opportunities here."
"This represents a more joined-up approach to attracting
investment and boosting the profile of the city and demonstrates
how we can leverage the business tourism sector to benefit the
wider economy."
The Government's Minister for Tourism, John Penrose, said:
"Birmingham's location, leading event venues such as the NEC,
and track record for delivering large, high profile events have
ensured that it has established a reputation as one of Europe's
premier meeting places."
"This was a very productive and useful visit that helped me
understand the strategy Birmingham is using to leverage its global
reputation as an events city with visitors and investors alike. The
close partnership working between the public and private sectors to
achieve this is proving successful and provides an innovative model
for other cities."
Neil Rami continued:
"We welcomed the support of the Minister today and look forward
to working closely with him ahead of the publication of the new
national strategy for tourism."
For more information on Marketing Birmingham, please visit their
website here: www.marketingbirmingham.com
[1] KPMG 2008
[2] KPMG 2008