More than 300 of the world's brightest minds concerned with climate change research will gather in Queenstown after a successful first-time bid by Bodeker Scientific, Tourism New Zealand's conference assistance programme (CAP) and the Queenstown Convention Bureau.
In January 2014, international delegates will attend the fifth annual general assembly of the project Stratospheric Processes and their Role in Climate, or SPARC, one of the core projects of the World Climate Research Programme.
Bureau manager Kylie Brittain said the winning the bid was "fantastic" for Queenstown.
"As our first CAP bid, we found the process to be very professional and the resulting win helps us reinforce our ability to host large events to the business events sector, which is a high-priority target market for us."
Tourism NZ marketing communications general manager Justin Watson said significant amounts of time and effort went into the bid, with the final pitch for SPARC made at a presentation in Zurich.
"Our involvement in the business events sector is about increasing the economic contribution of international visitors by attracting more high-value visitors.
"Research tells us that international delegates on average spend up to three times more than the usual international visitor."
Greg Bodeker, who presented the bid in Zurich, said the CAP process helped him secure both potential financial support and the assistance of conference bid experts.
"The result was that I was able to take a world-class proposal to Zurich that was both professional and comprehensive.
"Without the CAP fund support, this simply would not have happened.
"The financial leveraging that CAP provides for New Zealand makes a lot of economic sense."
Tourism NZ's business events team took responsibility for the conference assistance programme in June 2010.
"We have a dedicated business events team that are working in collaboration with industry partners to maximise the wealth of opportunity available from winning the right to host such international conferences," Mr Watson said.
