The annual CLIA Europe Conference, formerly the European Cruise Council Conference, was held in Brussels on 25 June 2013, attended by hundreds of key industry personalities, travel agents, as well as EC representatives. A Cruise Business Review correspondent was present at the event. Alan Lam reports.
As the first gathering since the inception of CLIA Europe, the conference addressed a number of regulatory issues - particularly the Schengen visa restrictions that was considered to be a pressing concern by the industry - and highlighted the economic contribution of cruise. CLIA’s Secretary General, Robert Ashdown, spelt out the priority of CLIA for 2013 as to ‘leverage the strength to overcome obstacles’. The legislators in attendance all demonstrated a much better understanding of cruise business and pledge their support for the industry.
Issues such as overcapacity, challenges from Asian shipbuilding and competitive deployment were also discussed extensively. One of the main concerns besides calling for a cruise-friendly legislative environment was how to accelerate the training of travel agents, making them advocates for the cruise sector.
A full report and analysis of this event will be published in the next issue of Cruise Business Review.
