Rwanda’s capital, Kigali, remains the second preferred city for hosting association meetings in Africa, as ranked by the International Congress and Convention Association (ICCA), the global meetings industry network. The 2022 ranking comes at a time when the global organization observed that approximately 85 percent of meetings were held in-person, after halting the survey for two years due to the Covid-19 pandemic. ALSO READ: Musanze listed among TIME’s world's greatest places of 2023 The ICCA represents the world’s leading suppliers in handling, transporting, and accommodating international meetings and events. Kigali ranked as the second most preferred destination for meetings in Africa after Cape Town, in South Africa. The organization counted 21 association meetings hosted in the city in 2022. This shows the efforts embarked on by the government to market the country as a Meetings, Incentives, Conferences and Exhibitions (MICE) destination are paying off. ALSO READ: Rwanda ranked seventh best travel destination for 2021 While on the recovery journey from the pandemic, as a service-based economy with tourism industry being the first largest income earner of the country, it has hosted thousands of people attending one conference after another. Rwanda which just hosted the 2023 Basketball Africa League (BAL) that attracted not only Rwandans but also foreigners from all walks of life, has been positioning itself as a sports tourism destination. ALSO READ: Rwanda among top 10 African countries in global soft power ranking Kigali hosted numerous events in the past few months and is expected to host many more upcoming association meetings. Among these will be the 2023 GYA Annual General Meeting (AGM), the first in-person AGM since 2019; the Corps Africa All-Country Conference 2023; the Kigali International Peace Marathon 2023; and the launch of the Annual Global Inclusive FinTech Forum, all of which are scheduled to take place in June. The FIBA Women’s AfroBasket, the top women’s basketball tournament in Africa; Women Deliver Conference 2023; Segal Family Foundation meeting 2023; and the Society for Conservation Biology’s International Congress for Conservation Biology, are some of the events already scheduled for July.
