Sourcing fair to expand to new HK venue
(China Daily)
Updated: 2004-06-01 15:33

In a vote of confidence for AsiaWorld-Expo, Hong Kong's HK$2.35-billion exhibition centre, Nasdaq-listed Global Sources said yesterday that it would expand its biannual sourcing fair to the new venue situated next to the international airport.

With an investment of over HK$400 million spread over three years, the business-to-business media company will launch China Sourcing Fairs at AsiaWorld-Expo starting from 2006. Currently Global Sources runs the fair - covering electronics & components, gifts & home products and DIY & home improvement - twice yearly in Shanghai.

Global Sources Chairman and CEO, Merle A. Hinrichs, cited statistics showing that 64 per cent of China's exports are centred on the Yangtze River Delta and the Pearl River Delta, thereby fully justifying the decision to expand to the territory.

"Foreign trade in the Pearl River Delta reached US$69.3 billion in the first three months of 2004 - up by 27 per cent year on year. The city of Guangzhou alone attracted US$3.55 billion in foreign investment in the first 11 months of 2003," he said.

Asia-World Expo will offer in excess of 70,000 square metres of space and a 13,500-seat arena when it opens at the end of 2005. Doubts have been raised that the latest exhibition centre would be oversupplying an already saturated market, not just from rival sites in Hong Kong but also increasingly on the mainland which is developing its own alternatives such as in Shanghai and Shenzhen.

However, according to the management, the centre will earn a profit in its first year of operations. They also emphasized that the 12 new fairs confirmed for the first year of operations in 2006 were all new to Hong Kong and were not siphoned away from any of Hong Kong's other exhibition centres.

Figures provided by Business Strategies Group Principal illustrate 60 per cent of the visitors to the fairs at the new centre will be from overseas, increasing the contribution made by the exhibition industry to the Hong Kong economy by as much as 40 per cent.

Secretary for Commerce, Industry and Technology, John Tsang said yesterday that rapid take-up of slots in the diary for the yet-to-be-completed site illustrated that the exhibition industry was more than receptive to the new centre.