There are a number of forthcoming Fairtrade events taking place locally including:
  • Film night - 2 March, 7-9pm
  • Fairtrade buffet - 5 March, 8pm (both at University of Birmingham)
Fairtrade futures: can Fairtrade transform global trade?

- 2 March 7-9pm at the Hippodrome, Banana-eating world record attempt

- 6/7 March at Birmingham Museum and Art Gallery

For further details, have a flick through the Forward newspaper,

page 4.

Travel Talk Radio

Travel Talk Radio provides the latest news and interviews from industry figures; these include Peter de Jong, President and CEO of PATA, the Pacific Asia Travel Association. He discusses the rapid growth in Asia Pacific travel and the challenges of achieving environmental and human capital sustainability.The interviews are available as downloadable MP3 files.

New Papers

Two new papers have been developed by Sabre Travel Network and PhoCusWright and are now available here. The publications are entitled:
  • Best practices in travel business intelligence
  • The changing role of travel management

These are based on two years of research and interviews with corporate travel managers and buyers, as well as detailed reviews of travel data management systems from travel management companies, GDS providers and third-party developers.

The Center for Hospitality Research have produced an article entitled 'Using tourist travel habits and preferences to assess strategic destination positioning'. It considers how consumer preferences and patterns of consumption can be used to reveal the status of a particular destination in its life cycle. The Plog destination life cycle model has been applied to consider the destination positioning of Costa Rica.

The Canadian Tourism Commission has produced a toolkit entitled Experiences. It offers advice to those wishing to offer an experience as a tourism product. It discusses the difference between a tourism product and a tourism experience, research methods to identify potential customers and ways to position/communicate the product. There are also best practices from the industry outlined in case studies including Canadian Mountain Holidays, Nimmo Bay resort, Uncommon Journeys and Lighthouse Picnics.

Registration may be required to access some resources, but access is usually free.

Play the Game 2009

The title for this year's Play the Game 2009 conference is Visions for Sport in Times of Crisis. It is to be hosted at the Centre for the International Business of Sport at Coventry University from 8-12 June. Themes include:
  • Ethics in governance: Will sports federations come clean?
  • Between Beijing and London: Mega-events as drivers of development
  • Business battles: The power struggles in football
  • Match-fixing: A blow to the core of sport
  • Terrible teenagers? Sport’s quest for the hearts and minds of the youth
  • Anti-Doping: Will the technological arms race come to an end?
  • Paralympic athletes: More different than the rest?
  • Sport for the Good: What is it good for?
  • Open forum
There is still time to submit papers, the deadline is 31 March.

VisitBritain news

VisitBritain's marketing planner tool can help create a personalised marketing proposal targeting overseas or domestic visitors. There are hundreds of opportunities available including meet the trade and media workshops, niche campaigns, the opportunity to work in partnership with well known non-tourism brands and many more. The system also allows users to select the best opportunities to reflect their business objectives and budget.

Trends in inbound tourism to the UK can be compared with those for other destinations during the current year by taking a look at the Destination Trends Data here.