Finns often disregard the fact that Finland is an internationally interesting and trendy travel destination. At the Nordic Travel Fair Matka hundreds of Finnish travel entrepreneurs market their products and services to foreign fair visitors, which amounted up to 2400 in 2006, 14 % of the professional visitors.

The Meet Finland project is designed to bring forward the destinations, products or services that have the most potential for the foreign market. The project is a product of cooperation between Matka fair and Helsinki City Tourist & Convention Bureau.

In Finland the state and municipalities put altogether 261 million euros annually in promoting the travel industry (2004). This money is spent on both domestic and foreign marketing, marketing congress and meeting services, promoting incentive trips, PR, and general marketing. One of the aims of Finland’s Official Tourism Strategy (Ministry of Trade and Industry, 21/2006) is to increase the amount of overnight stays from 10 million to 25 million.

Third of the tax money the citizens of Helsinki pay and is put to marketing Helsinki as a travel destination goes to foreign marketing. The Nordic Travel Fair Matka brings foreign travel trade professionals here to us which gives us a great opportunity to tell them about the possibilities of Helsinki cost-efficiently on our own territory, summarizes Marketing Manager Kari Halonen from the Helsinki City Tourist & Convention Bureau. The Finnish travel industry will surely get a boost also in May when Helsinki hosts the Eurovision Song Contest.

The Eurovision Song Contest in May is a key event for Helsinki. Preparations are well on the way and the
event will definitely get the premises and services it requires, assures Halonen.