Our Association was invited to the 2 panel discussions in ACE of M.I.C.E. Exhibition (Congress, Meeting and Activity Fair) performed in İstanbul Congress Center on February 27th-28th- March 1st 2014, assumed to be the biggest meeting of Turkey and Global M.I.CE sector.

In “Where is M.I.C.E. sector is heading to?” Summit Program took place on March 1st Association Chairman Mr. Kemalettin Solmaz and the following chairmen of the associations participated as panelists.

By the Moderator Yasemin Pirinçcioğlu (VIP Tourism CEO)

Ahmet Kunt Sağanak- President of Location Committee of TESDER

Alper Sesli-Chairman of DPID (Association of Direct Marketing Communicators)

Çetin Gürcün-General Secretary of TÜRSAB (Association of Turkish Travel Agencies)

Handan Boyce-Chairman of MPI (Meeting Professionals International) Turkish Club

Kemalettin Solmaz- Chairman of SSTD (Association of Exhibition and Stand Designers)

Meltem Bayazıt Tepeler- Chairman of YEPUD (Association of Planning and Application of Creative Activities)

Serap Oğuztaş Karadere- Chairman of SITE Turkey

At the beginning of his speech Mr. Solmaz emphasized that one of the most important issues of the Association was to develop the feature of design and stated the objective of foundation of the Association as “ provide the development of the companies being in service in fields of fair stand in fair organization industry, stage design for the presentations of the companies, design of fashion shows, festivals, concert areas, showroom, cultural exhibition and museum exhibition, determine and protect the rights and powers of these companies, determine common policies by providing the solutions of the problems in the sector; assist the provision of maximum customer satisfaction by improving the production and design quality standards” and indicated the importance of the cooperating with the other professional groups about this issue.

He also stated that the objectives of SSTD were to perform activities aimed at raise awareness of the companies offering service in the sector, strengthen the communication and cooperation among the professions, trace the developments in the world regarding the sector, perform operations at the level of producer, consumer, customer with the related institutions/organizations to provide offering qualified products designed for sectors and society.

The Chairman of SSTD afterwards stated the desire for cooperate with all public-private enterprises by joining forces with Turkish manufacturers in order to include the values produced in Turkey in spatial dimension and all parts of the world with the proper exhibition strategy to direct the sector as the manifest of SSTD and they spreaded on effort to bring IFES 2016 World Summit to İstanbul in which the organizations performing the same work in exhibition and stand sector.

He started the second part by mentioning about the necessity for the other profession groups to acknowledge the fair organization companies well. He stated that the issue of price emerged primarily rather than the qualified work, he highlighted that in the sector the work we had done had no definition and mentioned that they spreaded effort on this issue however bureaucratic barriers complicated the way to the solution. He also exemplified the effort to be gathered under the structure such as YEKON in order to protect the rights on intellectual and civilian structure and emphasized the necessity to create a structure rapidly on issuing a certificate.

Finally he mentioned that in Turkey the design right had not occurred, stated that it would be beneficial to see the shareholders activating within MICE as a whole and carry on by planning the budget properly.