Cuba’s MICE Tourism Looking Good in 2008

With over 35,000 foreign attendants to different events linked to culture, science and recreation, Cuba’s Convention Bureau hopes to see this year off with flying colors, officials from this institution said in a press meeting at the Chateau Miramar Hotel in Havana.

Music, medicine and environmental protection are topping the list of upcoming events to be held in Cuba later this year, including CUBADISCO 2007 (May 19 thru 27), an international festival in which Cuban music is the name of the game. This time around, Venezuela will be the guest country, while the ties between music and cinema will be on center stage.

Another newcomer to this year’s event will be the 6th Continental and 3rd Iberian American and Caribbean Congress on Natural Products and Medicine (Nov. 26 thru 30) at the International Conference Center in Havana. Also in this venue but a few months earlier (July 2 to 6), the International Convention on Development and the Environment will unfold.

Cuba posted a 60 percent growth in 2006 in terms of MICE (Meetings, Incentive, Congress and Events) trips, and a whopping 91 percent spike from 2004, according to the island nation’s Convention Bureau.