New design, usual quality, of course. These are two features of the Y2K+1 publication of the members of CENTREX International Exhibition Statistics Union, which is available from May 2002 for international business community.
The 10 CENTREX members - Poznan International Fair, Trade Fairs Brno, Hungexpo, Incheba Bratislava, Incheba Praha, Vystavisté Ceské Budejovice, Centrum Targowe Kielce, V-Trade Exhibitions Debrecen, Szeged Townscape Ltd. (from 2002 Kamaraexpo Ltd. Szeged) and with Euroindex Ltd. Kiev joined in 2002 - represent well over half of the exhibition market of 5 Central East Europe European countries. In figures for 2001 this means the 170 most significant exhibitions, 2.963.210 visitors, 37.848 exhibitors and 1.288.347 net square meters exhibition area.
The main activity of CENTREX is the launch, maintenance and promotion of a system of transparent exhibition statistics by which CENTREX maintains full compatibility with European standard. Highlight of the year is usually the publishing of the joint CENTREX Yearbook on the audited exhibition statistics of the members and its launch of the data at www.centrexstat.org web site.
Beyond her main activity the role of increasingly becoming the very hub of exhibition industry in Central East Europe gains momentum. Over and above her members CENTREX provides professional platforms for all organisers of exhibitions in Central East Europe for continuously transmitting and transferring of international expertise. For example in 2001 she started a joint co-ordinated campaign for promotion of fairs and exhibitions as the highly efficient marketing tool, and this is being maintained and continuously developed by her.
In 2002 her main objective is to ensure the global professional outlook for her members and the exhibition industry of the relevant countries as well, to reinforce the West European trade contacts eg. through institutional contacts like co-operation agreement with AUMA, the Association of the German Trade Fair Industry - to start with. A conference on exhibition industry general trends will be organised in Poznan in August 2002.
It is being followed - taken in the narrow sense - by the '1st Central East European Exhibition Forum', a trade workshop in Budapest in September 2002 which will be dedicated to the state and future of the most dynamically developing exhibition sector the building trade fairs. This will give opportunity for a major professional exchange of experience and future collaboration aspects. The main partner and sponsor of this workshop is HUNGEXPO Co. Ltd, one of the founding members of CENTREX.
Keynote speakers and targeted participants of the programme are the organisers of the building trade fairs in Central East Europe and business circles involved in strengthening them. Through the organisation CENTREX Union wishes to fill in the role of a "bridge": bridging not only the geographic distance between the participant, but rather much more the exchange of experience and know-how, developing personal contacts and reinforcing the communication among each other. (The geographic range of participants includes fair organisers of more than 12 CEE countries interested in the topic.)