'Lisbon hosted 50% of the congresses held in Portugal'

'Lisbon hosted 50% of the congresses held in Portugal'

Vítor Costa, Associação Turismo de Lisboa (ATL)'s general director, mentioned this fact when commenting on ICCA's ranking results released on May 13th, which put the Portuguese capital in the top 6 in the world, ahead of cities like London and Singapore.

"We have an enviable international positioning in terms of congresses and similar events, which contributes to a good profitability of tourism, given the greater economic weight of this product," acknowledged ATL's director. "Lisbon hosted 50% of the events that took place in Portugal and, if we consider the region of Lisbon, this percentage rises to 55%, thus contributing to the country having obtained an excellent place in the international ranking." Vítor Costa also hopes "that these good results stimulate the convergence between Lisbon Convention Bureau", which is a department of ATL, "and Turismo de Portugal".

The need for a new Congress Centre

Vítor Costa concluded that "these results make more current the proposal, which has been made in the successive Strategic Tourism Plans, of creating a large Congress Centre of institutional nature, capable of welcoming the large congresses that today are hardly possible in Lisbon due to insufficient infrastructure.”