Malaysia's Border Reopening is Crucial for Business Events Recovery

Malaysia Convention & Exhibition Bureau, the leading business events bureau in the country will be organising a total of 81 business events thus far for the year 2022, and are expecting around 113,700 delegates to Malaysia, contributing to a total of RM834 million in estimated economic impact. Since its establishment, MyCEB has also successfully secured more than 2,600 events, bringing in more than 1.3 million international delegates which translated to RM17 billion estimated economic impact from the year 2010 up to the year 2020.

Malaysia's Border Reopening is Crucial for Business Events Recovery 

The reopening of Malaysia’s border to the international visitors especially the business events industry will allow economic activities to rejuvenate in its entire spectrum from businesses, investments, conferences, and exhibitions. In this regard, MyCEB and the business events industry support the Majlis Pemulihan Negara (MPN) statement that the government should set a definite timeline for the reopening of the country’s borders to restore economic activities, including trade, industry, investment and tourism.

Dato’ Sri Abdul Khani Daud, Chief Executive Officer of Malaysia Convention & Exhibition Bureau (MyCEB), stated: “This year, we welcome MPN’s statement on borders reopening because Malaysia will play host to numerous international and regional business events activities. Allowing international delegates to attend these activities will certainly benefit not only the organisers but also the industry and the nation. The government's earlier initiatives such as the Langkawi International Tourism Travel Bubble and the Singapore-Malaysia Vaccinated Travel Lane (VTL) has proven that the country can move towards careful reopening. 

Later this month, Malaysia will be hosting the World Congress of Nephrology which usually attracts around 5,000 delegates in the past. However, the border closure has restricted the interest of international delegates attending the event in Kuala Lumpur. It is reported that the event will continue as planned in a hybrid format with high registration from the local expert community which has been encouraging. Imagine if our borders have been reopened in a safe and responsible manner, we would be able to have this interaction between national and international delegates during this event. 

“When business events are allowed to operate at the end of last year, we saw that the industry has kickstart with various events nationwide. We believe this is time for us to move forward and welcome the international delegates,” ended Dato’ Sri Khani.