MIF turns 20 with no extra budget for celebrations

IPIM’s executive director Irene Lau

The 20th edition of the Macao International Trade and Investment Fair (MIF) kicks off on Thursday and has the same estimated budget as the previous two editions: MOP 36 million.
According to Irene Lau, executive director of the Institute for Promotion of Trade and Investment of Macau, the “substantial economic adjustments” that the government “is implementing” are also being felt by the event. However, this is expected to be the biggest event ever, with a 22 percent increase in the number of participating companies and organizations, bringing the total to 950, representing more than 50 countries and territories.
The number of visitors is also expected to increase, according to Ms Lau, who spoke at the press conference held yesterday to introduce this year’s event. “There is an increase of 6 percent on the number of registered professional visitors, for a total of 4700 this year,” she said.
The exhibition area will now exceed 37,000 square meters in order to accommodate the two thousand exhibitor booths that promise to have “richer and more diverse content than last year,” said Lau.
As one of the novelties of this year’s exhibition, there will an added number of products from the Portuguese-speaking countries, with service providers from different areas, ranging from finance to advertising, through to  translation, electronic commerce, tourism and legal advice. All of such services will be presented in a bilingual manner, reinforcing Macau’s commitment to cooperate with Lusophone countries’.
This year, the fair will be focused around eight broad topics: “The Belt and Road”, the “Platform between China and the Portuguese-speaking countries”, the “Cultural and Creative Industries”, and the “Traditional Chinese Medicine Industry” will be some of the most comprehensively examined themes.
The 20th MIF will open its doors on October 22 and will run until October 25 at the Venetian Macao Convention and Exhibition Center. RM

IPIM to open delegation in Lisbon in early 2016

IPIM will soon open a permanent representative office in Lisbon, the institute’s board member Glória Batalha revealed on the sidelines of the MIF presentation press conference.
According to Batalha, the office is expected to be opened during the first quarter of 2016 and will be the first in a series of these offices that IPIM plans to open in several Portuguese-speaking countries.
The office should occupy a nearby venue to the offices of the Economic and Commercial Delegation of Macau in the Portuguese capital, and will primarily provide support, especially focusing on small and medium-sized enterprises during the first phase, to Portuguese companies that plan to invest in the Chinese market and vice-versa.
IPIM is still considering its expansion plans, but as Ms Batalha informed the press, the second in line to follow the opening in Lisbon should be Brazil during the second half of 2016.