Maldives is showcased colorfully at China’s number one B2B Fair, China Outbound Travel & Tourism Market 2018 (COTTM) in Beijing, China. Entering its 15th consecutive year, COTTM is widely recognized as the industry’s most important platform and remains the only business-to-business event that focuses solely on the growing outbound tourism market in China. While China is the main contributing market the Maldives tourism industry, the Maldives presence will be showcased at COTTM with 20 participants from 10 companies at a 102sqm stand from 15-17 April 2019.
During the three-day exhibition, the Maldivian Ambassador to China, Hon. Mohamed Faisal, will represent the Maldives delegation along with other government officials from the Maldives Embassy based in China and the Maldives Marketing & Public Relations Corporation and representatives from the Maldivian tourism industry. The delegation will meet with travel industry professionals and discuss potential future collaborations to further promote Maldives in China.
This year, various activities are held at the Maldives stand for the visitors to experience a bit of the Sunny side of life. These include calligraphy, where names of visitors attending the stand are written in Maldivian language (Dhivehi) unique to the Maldives. Maldivian traditional snacks will be displayed at the stand where visitors get to taste authentic Maldivian snacks, this is one of the most attractive aspects of the Maldives stand for the visitors. Visitors can also experience underwater beauty of Maldives through a virtual reality headset. Additionally visitors can pose for pictures near the photo booth placed at the stand, using frame board and post it on social media to win a surprise gift.
In 2018, the Maldives welcomed 283,116 visitors from China, which represented 19.1% of total visitor arrivals to the country during the year. China has been the biggest source market for the Maldives for the past 9 years and will continue to play an important role in the Maldives travel industry. Therefore COTTM is the perfect platform to display Maldives vacation products to a prime audience.