The ITIC Global Tourism Investment Summit will be held in London on Tuesday 8th November at WTM ExCel and on Wednesday 9th November 2022 at the Canary Riverside Plaza Hotel to discuss the future of investments in sustainable tourism projects.

The World Bank has recently warned that the world might be edging dangerously close to a recession in 2023 due to the combined effects of high inflation, the rise in interest rates and the growing debt burden of developing countries.

However, against this backdrop of economic uncertainties, the travel and tourism industry is giving a glitter of hope since the World Travel & Tourism Council predicts that the Asia-Pacific travel industry could fully recover by next year while the United Nations World Tourism Organisation (UNWTO) stated that tourism is showing strong signs of recovery with international tourist arrivals almost tripling from January to July 2022 (+172%) compared to the same period in 2021.

ITIC’s much-awaited annual event will showcase Botswana as its Tier One Partner for the Summit that will serve as a springboard to trigger the interest of potential participants in dis-covering the new land of tourism investment opportunities of this beautiful destination and its successful transition into a sustainable tourism destination that has integrated social in-clusion and protection of the environment as well as its heritage in developments while en-suring a fair return for investors.

The Chairman of ITIC and former Secretary-General of UNWTO, Dr Taleb Rifai, has expressed his satisfaction that the forthcoming ITIC Global Investment Summit will “substantially con-tribute to heighten the degree of preparedness of several tourism destinations in developing mitigating elements that will cushion the effects of any global recession on them and open new opportunities through their sustainable transformation.”

In addition, the ITIC Global Investment Summit will unveil the outlook for the travel and tourism sector for 2023, giving thought-provoking insights in new trends in sustainability, changes in customers’ behaviour that are affecting the ROI of hotels and tourism attractions, and cover the critical factors which attract investments in tourism, especially the right mix of incentives and conducive policies.

The topics of smart cities, real estate, tourism and hotel projects from Botswana, Brazil, Oman, Tanzania, Saint Lucia and Bulgaria will be presented during the Summit. Furthermore, the Commonwealth Ministerial Panel will shed light on the opportunities arising within the Commonwealth to boost investment while financial analysts will unveil the Environmental, Social and Governance (ESG) investing approaches.

The audience and speakers of the Summit will consist of policy makers, Ministers of Tourism for several countries, investors, decision-makers and project owners/developers of the tour-ism industry from all over the world. They will gather to discuss the various issues to be ad-dressed to shape the resilience of the future global travel and tourism sector.

During the summit, ITIC will unveil several bankable tourism projects to potential investors and developers. On Monday 7th and Tuesday 8th November, ITIC will create a Deal Room at WTM ExCel at the South Gallery to facilitate meetings between Project Developers and the ITIC Team to discuss the investment potential of their projects. A Deal Room and networking area will also be available at the Canary Riverside Plaza Hotel on Wednesday 9th November during the full day summit with roundtables giving access to global businesses to promote joint ventures/partnerships dedicated to accelerating investment in the travel and tourism sector.

With the support of IFC and Brazil’s Ministry of Tourism, the summit programme will provide a conducive networking and business environment that will add massive business value to the tourism developers to discuss the potential of their projects in quest of investment. ITIC will ensure follow-up with the project owners/developers, potential investors after the summit and source, facilitate and structure investments in the selected bankable projects.

Among the personalities who have already confirmed their participation in the different panel discussions:
• Hon. Philda Nani Kereng, Minister of Environment and Tourism, Botswana;
• Hon. Edmund Bartlett, Minister of Tourism of Jamaica;
• Hon. Elena Kountoura, Member of European Parliament;
• H.E. Nasise Challi Jira, Minister of Tourism, Ethiopia;
• H.E Nayef Al-Fayez Minister of Tourism and Antiquities of Jordan;
• H.E Ahmed Issa, Minister of Tourism and Antiquities of Egypt;
• Cuthbert Ncube, Executive Chairman, African Tourism Board;
• Sadia Sajjd, Country Manager UK, Ireland, Denmark and Malta, IFC;
• Ken Osei, Principal Investment Officer, IFC

ITIC’s CEO, Ibrahim Ayoub, rejoices that the ITIC Global Investment Summit has within a pe-riod of five years, raised to the enviable status of a not-to-be missed event in the world’s travel and tourism landscape. “It will empower the different stakeholders to be in the start-ing blocks for 2023”, Ayoub concluded.

To attend the event, delegates have to register to the following links:
1. Event on Tuesday 8th November 2022 at WTM ExCel – Insight Stage, Register here
2. For the full day Investment Summit on Wednesday 9th November 2022 at Canary Riv-erside Plaza Hotel, Canary Wharf, register here or visit www.itic.uk