Galway as a leading Ôconference cityÕ is not a new idea

Date Published: {J}

An extraordinary few weeks in Galway in respect of the number of major conferences held here, will reawaken memories for many in the city of the time when the concept of Galway as ‘a conference city’ was one of the major campaigns undertaken by civic leaders.

It is only when the spending power of more than 1,000 people attending a conference, their bed nights, their meals, and the hire of conference facilities themselves are taken into account, that the earnings for Galway begin to become obvious.

This is only one of what I call ‘the hidden industries’ in Galway. Not too many people fully appreciate the hundreds of jobs which are created and sustained by conferences. The various educational establishments in the city are also huge providers of jobs in their own right, but are not always perceived as such.

But what would Galway be like without the presence of over 20,000 students who attend National University of Ireland Galway and the Galway Mayo Institute of Technology? Of course, it is gross and over the top to describe them as ‘industries’, but they are a huge part of what makes up Galway both socially and economically.

And when NUI and GMIT are ‘closed’ at the end of the academic year, whole areas still remain a hive of activity because of the numbers of visiting academics, scholars, research workers and summer school students from all over the world.

In the case of conferences, the ‘rule of thumb’ appears to be that 1,000 people for a few nights will amount to more than a €5 million spend in the city – and doing the sums on sessions such as the two teachers’ conferences held over Easter, and then the Labour Party annual conference held last weekend, it amounts to a healthy income which was spread throughout the economy of the area.

An important aspect of this type of ‘tourism’ is that it does not depend on good weather, or the other vagaries – what people need are good facilities for meetings, in some cases some services like audio-visual aids, possibly translation services, and decent transport links which will enable them to get in and out comfortably.

I am not quite sure what happened the ‘conference city’ concept advocated widely more than 40 years ago – perhaps it succeeded, but I rather think that it ‘worked when it worked’.

For more, read this week's Galway City Tribune.