Beyond tangible benefits, Singapore may be a ‘role model’ if World Economic Forum meeting in 2021 goes well: Analysts

• Hosting the World Economic Forum's annual meeting in Singapore will be a boost to the country’s global reputation, analysts and industry players said
• The economic spinoff from the event would depend on how many participants physically attend it
• There will be health risks involved, but these can be mitigated by the rollout of vaccines and safe management measures, analysts said

SINGAPORE — With Singapore set to host the World Economic Forum's (WEF) annual meeting in May next year, analysts said that the indirect impact of this event would far outweigh the tangible benefits, even though it is still too early to put a number to the economic outcomes.

It was announced on Monday (Dec 7) that Singapore will play host to the WEF meeting — a gathering for global business and political elites — due to the worsening Covid-19 pandemic in Europe. The event is traditionally held in Davos, Switzerland and is the first time it will be held in Asia, moving from its usual late-January timing to May.

Calling this a “watershed moment” for Singapore to move back to some economic normalcy, Dr Lawrence Loh, the director of the Centre for Governance, Institutions and Organisations at the National University of Singapore (NUS) Business School, said that the Republic will be one of the first countries to transit to holding large-scale events early on during this global health crisis.  

“This is definitely a big coup for us… The world is watching how Singapore is managing this. It will create a role model for the world on how to hold large-scale events (during a pandemic),” he said. 

INDIRECT BENEFITS TO SINGAPORE

It has been about 15 years since Singapore hosted a major global forum. The last time was the 2006 International Monetary Fund (IMF) and World Bank annual meetings.

At that time, 20,000 delegates converged here for the meetings, which were estimated to have generated S$50 million in tourism receipts — with another S$120 million from other events and business opportunities arising out of the main gathering itself. 

In a more recent high-profile event that Singapore hosted in 2018  — the summit between then-American president Donald Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un — media intelligence firm Meltwater estimated that the country gained more than S$700 million in exposure and attracted 2,500 journalists alone.

In 2019, about 3,000 people took part in the last WEF meeting in Davos.

Analysts who spoke to TODAY did not put a number to how much tourism receipts could be generated from the WEF meeting next year, but Dr Loh estimated that the revenue from the event might be lower than the IMF-World Bank meetings since not all participants may be willing to travel.

Economist Song Seng Wun from CIMB private banking said that the WEF meeting is just a one-off event, and that the majority of Singapore’s tourism dollars, which were close to S$28 billion in 2019, came from the frequent professional gatherings of surgeons, engineers and psychiatrists here that do not attract media attention.  

Mr James Walton, a transportation, hospitality and services sector leader at consultancy Deloitte Singapore, reasoned that if the WEF meeting adopts a hybrid approach where physical audience size is limited and other participants join in virtually, tourist receipts will not be as significant.

Senior economist Irvin Seah from DBS bank is of the view that the indirect benefits of hosting the forum would be far greater for Singapore than the tourism receipts that it could generate. 

“To me, the greater value is in global leaders seeing Singapore as a safe destination to have a high-level meeting and the reinforcement of Singapore’s global status as a country that can execute such a big event in a very delicate environment.”

COVID-19 TRANSMISSION RISKS

However, as with what happened this week with the Royal Caribbean cruise ship that had a false positive Covid-19 case, there are always risks in further reopening the economy.  

Trade and Industry Minister Chan Chun Sing told reporters earlier that Singapore should not “get too far ahead of ourselves” and that organisers will have to ensure the safety of residents and participants at the forum. 

While the Royal Caribbean incident may have cast doubts on the feasibility of hosting WEF safely, Dr Loh said that the progressive rollout of Covid-19 vaccines over the next few months will significantly reduce the risk of hosting the WEF meeting.  

Mr Seah of DBS believes that people would be “more forgiving” if there were to be a Covid-19 outbreak at WEF's event, because everyone is aware of the risks involved in hosting such a meeting during a pandemic. 

Health experts said that the chances of the forum turning into a “super spreader” event can be negligible with border control and testing measures. 

Professor Yik-Ying Teo, the dean of NUS’ Saw Swee Hock School of Public Health, said that Singapore has the capability to ensure that there will be practically no undetected Covid-19 cases entering the country, and to identify in a timely manner any cases that slip through checks. 

A BOOST TO EVENTS AND CONFERENCES SECTOR 

Unsurprisingly, industry players that organise meetings, incentives, conferences and exhibitions (Mice) and that have been struggling due to the decimation of global business travel are excited about the WEF event coming to Singapore. 

The Singapore Tourism Board (STB) has allowed Mice events to resume but capped at a maximum of 250 participants. Safety measures include segregating participants into cohorts, with no intermingling among them.  

Mr Adam Esoof Piperdy, chief executive officer and founder of Mice event organiser Unearthed Productions, said that his company has been improving its processes for organising small-scale events and believes that it can eventually organise an event as large as the WEF meeting.

“I don’t think the end goal is a 250-people event. We are trying it out first. Once done and we are all confident that we can manage, it should go up higher to 500, maybe to 1,000,” he said. 

For Ms Janet Tan-Collis, the chief executive officer of East West Planners, a destination and events management company, she said that enquiries from corporate clients looking to visit Singapore for the WEF meeting started pouring in within 24 hours of the announcement of the news.

It was a stark cry from the whole of this year where business had been “zero”.  

Ms Tan-Collis said that hosting the WEF event here will give “confidence and comfort” to other companies that are also looking to hold their meetings in Singapore. 

Mr Aloysius Arlando, chief executive officer of SingEx, the operator of convention centre Singapore Expo, said that the event is an opportunity for his company to showcase “a new standard of audience engagement”.

He added that SingEx has been preparing for “redesigned event experiences” such as having them in hybrid formats akin to the recently concluded Singapore Fintech Festival. 

Mr Arlando, who is also the president of the Singapore Association of Convention and Exhibition Organisers and Suppliers, said that successful pilot business events as well as safe management guidelines and best practices drawn up by the Mice industry put the country “in good stead” to host global business events such as the WEF meeting.