A City of Trade Shows, Conferences and Meetings

Rosario is consolidating

Rosario is consolidating an year on year growth as host of conferences, seminars, symposiums and business tourism-related activities, including trade shows, business events and expos. The city is now positioned as a key venue, nationally and internationally.

In terms of the economic impact of business tourism, Rosario ranks second in the country, outranked only by Buenos Aires. As an example, over 200 national and international meetings on scientific, technological and production related matters were held in 2005, with more than 150,000 attendants, plus over 40 trade shows and expos attended by more than 400,000 local and foreign visitors.

Excellent host city for trade shows and conferences, modern venues equipped with state-of-the-art infrastructure and technology, service providers that have deserved national and international appreciation for offering great price-quality ratio. Hotels and restaurants that satisfy the stringent demand of domestic and foreign clients. Local service providers that have accompanied Rosario growth as business tourism destination with investment and training.

Furthermore, the metropolis offers notable telecommunication infrastructure, comfortable access roads for visitors that add to the option of the port and the international airport that connect the city to the world.

In this context, private investment is planning a strong move to absorb this market. Large hotel chains, a modern casino and an excellent convention center are investments that will add 10,000 seats for seminars, meetings and conferences.

The important economic volume of the service provider industry has made Rosario the center of interest of meeting planners across the country.

The most relevant actors in the industry, such as the Chambers of Commerce, Rosario Bureau, Rosario Tourist Board as well as operators and investors, have great expectations that this trend will consolidate in the short term.

The number of foreign visitors to conferences has increased enormously in recent years. Rosario was host to several international conferences, including:

Unlike Buenos Aires, that features large scale infrastructure, Rosario is positioned as an alternative for meeting planners due to its competitive advantages: lower planning costs, highly competitive services, significant cultural offer, mini-tourism alternatives for conference attendants and, most importantly, a city of human scale. So much so that the cost-benefit ratio is highly beneficial.

The III International Congress of the Spanish Language was a turning point that showed the city has great potential for the future. Since 2003, the number of meetings has increased steadily, by 20% following expert estimates.

FIAR is held every two years and has become a milestone for the food industry, nationally and internationally. It currently occupies 24,000 sq. meters. This food fair was the starting point to consolidate a diversified agenda of fairs that shows stimulating perspectives for the city.

Rosario is therefore opening its doors to Argentina and the world, offering itself to be host of relevant occurrences that leave a mark on the city and its residents.

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III International Congress of the Spanish Language

Rosario turned out in its finest to hold the III International Congress of the Spanish Language, November 17-20, 2004 at El Circulo Theater and the Complejo Parque de España.

The Congress was called to discuss the Spanish language, technology and new integration. As in its previous editions, this prestigious congress gathered key players in politics, culture and education, all well-known worldwide. The Kings of Spain attended the congress as well as other international renowned figures: writers, members of the academia, intellectuals, professionals and experts in linguistics, communication and Spanish.

Rosario was chosen as host city because of its intense cultural life and because, of all cities with a Spanish tradition, Rosario offered the best hospitality infrastructure for a congress as important as this one.

Opening remarks were delivered by his Majesty, Juan Carlos, King of Spain, followed by the Argentine President, Nestor Kirchner only before the wonderful speeches by writers Carlos Fuentes, Hector Tizon and Francisco Ayala. The congress debated linguistic identity and globalization, one of its main topics. Commemorating the fourth centennial of the first publishing of Don Quixote, a brand-new edition was released by the Real Academia Española.

"Linguistic identity and globalization" was the Congress' main topic. There were dozens of experts from Spanish speaking countries as well as some of the greatest contemporary writers, Carlos Fuentes and Hector Tizon, Jose Saramago, Ernesto Sabato, Ernesto Cardenal, Mario Benedetti, Alfredo Bryce Echenique, Tomas Eloy Martinez, Alvaro Mutis, Nelida Piñon, Juan Jose Saer, Angelica Gorodisher and Roberto Fontanarrosa.

The Congress comprised a series of lectures and an important program of parallel cultural activities. It placed Rosario in national and international media. It showed to the city and to the world that Rosario was ready to host large international conferences, to offer a diverse cultural production, urban heritage and human warmth.

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International Food Trade Show

In 1998, the local government made the decision of holding a trade show for the main industry in the region, the food industry. Food industry represents 21% of the geographic gross product. The show would support sectorial business opportunities, foster internationalisation of food companies and work hard to become a new scheduled date in the list of food and beverage international events.

And so, FIAR was born. The first show was also a window for the productive profile of the province of Santa Fe, where Rosario is the epicenter of the largest agroindustrial complex in South America. The privileged geographical location of the city allowed then and allows now the articulation of production and marketing efforts of a vast region that embraces Argentina, the south of Brazil, Uruguay, Paraguay, Bolivia and Chile, a region that accounts for 85% of the industrial and commercial activity in South America.

After four successful editions, FIAR is today a megashow of products and services linked to the food industry and the main business center in the central area of Argentina.

The show extends over 24,000 roofed sq. meters. The expo includes manufacturers, producers, importers, exporters, equipment suppliers, processes and technology, inputs and services thus subsuming the complete offer and demand of the industry.

The show features a business center, a forum for entrepreneurs, and three exclusive areas for company executives. FIAR is visited by significant buyers, national and international authorities of the industry and representatives of marketing and distribution channels in over twenty-five countries.

The 2005 edition gathered approximately 600 exhibitors that showed their products to 80,000 national and international visitors who could also witnessed the progress accomplished by a food industry that operates in a balanced, profitable context.

FIAR International Business Center offered ample opportunities for professionals of the region, distributors and trade operators of the four world blocks. FIAR has become a platform for the closing of transactions, for entering into business alliances, for establishing commercial and financial exchanges.

FIAR sums up the efforts made by the public and the private sector and the strong involvement of the local government in the organization and development of the show. It is supported by the government of the province of Santa Fe and the COFER (Rosario Trade Show Consortium) made up by representatives of the city business associations. The sponsors, the attendants, the exhibitors have all together positioned FIAR as the most important food show in the country and as number 7 in Latin America.

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Cities for Unity

The LatinAmerican encounter of city mayors, "Cities for Unity" was held in Rosario, at El Circulo theater on June 2 and 3, 2005.

The encounter gathered city mayors, members of city councils, officers of local executives, members of the legislative and citizens from over three hundred cities in Uruguay, Bolivia, Chile, Colombia, Paraguay, Mexico, Ecuador, Peru, Italy, Spain, Austria, the Tchek Republic and Slovakia.

The encounter was on an initiative of the MPU (Political Movements for Unity) delegation in Argentina, Brazil and Uruguay, a political expression of the Movimiento de los Focolares. Their purpose was to build and contribute to the Latin American integration from a positive perspective of universal fraternity, inspired by the integration spirit shown by Latin American peoples and governments.

The opening session was attended by Chiara Lubich, founder of MPU, Miguel Lifschitz, Rosario city mayor, Herwig Van Staa, Innsbruk city mayor, Juan Esteban Belderrain, from MPU Argentina and thanks to videoconference technology, by Romano Prodi, Prime Minister of Italy and former president of the European Commission, and one of the most active supporters of the encounter.

The purpose of the encounter was to create a space for debate and for the exchange of experiences among those responsible of city management in all of Latin America, on the need to implement a political culture towards fraternal links among municipalities.

Before the need to deepen democracy and to foster equality, fraternity was the topic, fraternity as a political category since it is in itself an inspiring concept towards innovative practices to overcome the multiple fractures and conflicts that today are an obstacle to fair development.

It was in this context that the program focused on presenting the three pillars of a political action based on fraternity:

Experiences lived in other countries that were successful in overcoming divisions between the government and the opposition, politics and citizenship or between cities were presented. These experiences could be used as basis for designing state policies on local development strategies and on solutions for prioritary social issues.

The encounter was a contribution to LatinAmerican integration from a positive perspective that focuses on contributing to universal unity and fraternity.

The encounter was sponsored by the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Argentina and by the Municipality of Rosario. It offered the opportunity to share political praxis in different countries that, based on fraternity, could overcome difficulties between the government and the opposition, political and citizens’ institutions and, at the same time, implement strategies towards local development and towards the solution of priority socioeconomic issues.

This significant encounter, Cities for Unity, consolidates Rosario’s vision of becoming a meeting point where individuals and peoples of the most diverse origins can communicate, individuals with roots in the many immigration flows that shaped the city and provided for its rich cultural diversity, its political and social tradition.

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The Rosario Experience

In December 2003, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) honoured the city of Rosario for being a successful management experience in governance and local advancement in Latin America. The prize recognized the accomplishments of local authorities and of Rosario citizens in the past decade. Rosario was chosen out of more than two hundred and fifty local management experiences.

The prize awarded by the UNDP outlined the consolidation of a comprehensive development model for the city that has continuously and steadily enhanced the quality of life of Rosario residents. To celebrate the prize, Rosario hosted the Governance Forum, March 29 and April 1, 2005.

The opening ceremony was chaired by the City Mayor, Miguel Lifschitz, the European Union Ambassador in Argentina, Angelos Pagkratis, the UNDP consultant on local governance for Latin America, Juan Manuel Salazar, the UNDP representative in Argentina, Carlos Felipe Martinez and the federal under Secretary of Municipalities and Towns, Claudio Leoni. The Forum was attended by representatives of more than 1,150 cities in Latin America.

Rosario Experience was an international conference organized to present and share the accomplishments of the city in local development in the past ten years. It included:

It was the third edition of the Governance Forum. The first edition was in Guayaquil, Ecuador and the second, in Bogota, Colombia.

The "Rosario Experience. More City, More Human" was an exchange of good local governance practices. The city showed why the UNDP selected Rosario as a successful example of public policies based on ample social consensus.

Rosario has become a participative and efficient city by building a socially responsible, democratic and participative state. Its most meaningful expression is the municipal decentralisation process. Decentralisation involved the transfer of administrative steps and service provision-related procedures; it also became a key political management tool to bring the government closer to citizens and therefore favour citizen participation.

Rosario Strategic Plan that designed urban plans for individual Districts and the experience of the participative budget strengthened the social mesh by fostering the role played by Rosario civil society, by the Presupuesto Participativo (to promote direct participation of citizens in the decision-making process).

It is in this context that the following programs also stand out: Rosario Habitat, Urban Agriculture, the regeneration of the riverline along the Parana and the islands, Childhood Protection, Crecer Centers, the City of Children, the Farm of Childhood, the Children’s Playground and the Island of Inventions together with a model public health, free of charge and of excellent quality, recognized worldwide.

This international appreciation has positioned Rosario in the world as a successful local governance experience. It was also an incentive to continue the hard work based on public policies with a vision, that embrace strategies, programs and initiatives for social inclusion and democratic participation with quality of life.  

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