SriLankan Airlines flies mice tourism higher

With Sri Lanka now enjoying the multiple dividends of peace, the country’s MICE market is also on an upward curve, mirroring the country’s boom in leisure traffic.

Last year a total of 447,890 people visited Sri Lanka, and up to September this year a total of 445,228 have visited the country.    

In November 200 delegates from all over the world will arrive in Colombo for the World Buddhist Federation Conference.

This closely follows three successful MICE events held last month.  

The 600 delegate ‘Asia Micro Finance Conference’, the Chartered Institute of Logistics and Transport (CILT) Conference with its 150 international delegates and the MF Network Corporation Conference for 150 delegates from different parts of the world.

In the pipeline for early next year are the Junior Squash Championships in February, the International Ports Conference and the Eco-Tourism Conference in June.

As an active promoter of MICE tourism, the national carrier has been working together with the Sri Lanka Convention Bureau to promote two specific genres of MICE traffic.

The first is the total package where SriLankan Airlines undertakes the entire package from ground arrangements and hotels to conference and the air travel. These packages are sold network wide. The other category is where the airline offers discounted fares for tickets only. They also further support MICE tourism by offering complimentary tickets to guest speakers and rebated tickets to local event organisers to travel overseas to promote MICE events, where the airline has the official carrier status.

Although Sri Lanka has been in the MICE market for the past 25 years, MICE traffic experienced a downturn since Sri Lanka was classified as an ‘unsafe destination’ by many countries. However, even during that time, Sri Lanka did host large conferences like the International Conference on AIDS in Asia Pacific (ICAAP) in 2007 with 2000 plus participants.

But, with the end of the war and the withdrawal of negative travel advisories there has been a marked resurgence in the MICE business.

Sri Lanka enjoys an enviable reputation as a value-for-money destination especially in the South Asian region, with growing popularity as a MICE destination in India and Pakistan. SriLankan has been the official carrier for over 20 conferences since the 30 year old civil war ended in May last year.

While the Sri Lanka Convention Bureau the Sri Lanka Tourist Board are responsible for marketing MICE tourism in Sri Lanka, SriLankan Airlines enjoys direct inquiries from corporates because of their world class reputation as the country’s  national carrier and its excellent frequency and network in the south Asian region especially in India . SriLankan Airlines currently has the best frequency out of India with 50 flights a week and the best network with six destinations and is an obvious choice of destination for Indian MICE traffic. The airline participates in international MICE trade fairs such as IMEX and ITCMA to promote Sri Lanka as a MICE destination and the airline as the official carrier.

With MICE traffic comprising more top end corporate clients, this has in parallel been an excellent opportunity to showcase SriLankan Airlines’ Business Class which has recently been upgraded to a new star class service and will undergo further refurbishments with flat beds seating and AVOD systems.

With SriLankan Airlines launching its Air Taxis, the airline also has ambitious plans to bring in more high-end and small exclusive groups for parleys in Sri Lanka. Last year’s meeting of Small and Luxury Hotels Owners was highly successful with SriLankan Airlines as the Partner Airline.