China, Italy and France TOP 3 exhibiting countries at German trade fairs

In 2017, almost all regions in the world contributed to the growth in the number of exhibitors presenting their products at trade fairs in Germany. The only exception was North America. The levels of participation from South, East and Central Asia increased by significantly more than the average – by 11.2% compared to each of the previous events. These are results of calculations by AUMA – Association of the German Trade Fair Industry.

In total, 107.830 foreign exhibitors were counted at 157 international events in Germany. The levels of foreign participation grew by 6.3% overall. The main driver of growth was again China with an increase of 16% (13.999 exhibitors in total). This meant that for the first time in an odd-numbered year China was ranked first among the exhibitor countries, with Italy (13.145) previously having been ranked first in each of these years. France ranked third with 6.493 exhibitors.

Other countries among the 20 most important exhibitor countries also recorded significant increases, such as Japan (23%), Czech Republic and Portugal (15% each) and Poland (12%). Only the USA registered 5% fewer participations mainly due to their role as partner country of Hannover Messe one year ago. Other countries with relatively high numbers of exhibitors also recorded a strong growth in exhibitors, such as Croatia (25%), Greece (20%) and Russia (17%). Following marked declines in the levels of Russian participation in recent years due to economic sanctions, there were once again increases at some technology-themed trade fairs. Relatively significant declines were recorded by Morocco (-25%), the Philippines (-15%) and the United Arab Emirates (-10%).

Among the continents or economic regions, alongside South, East and Central Asia, Australia/Oceania saw the biggest increase of 12%. They were followed by the European countries outside the EU (+7%) and the EU with around +6%. The growth rates of Africa, Latin America and the Middle East hit the level of just 1-2%. An individual development worthy of note was that Argentina overtook Brazil as the most important exhibitor country from Latin America for the first time, thanks to strong export marketing for food and wine.