Mexico offers a wide array of opportunities for meeting groups. There are spacious resorts with white-sand beaches and modern hotels in colorful interior cities offering museums, galleries, and performing arts. From crystal clear waters teeming with colorful fish to the majestic Sierra Madre Mountains, Mexico is also the place for groups seeking outdoor adventure. In short, it has something for everyone.

Last month, the strategic business unit for the Mexico Tourism Board hosted an "Association Day" in Washington, D.C. to highlight its many diverse group offerings.

Some of the destinations that were showcased during "Association Day" as being able to accommodate citywide congresses for up to 8,000 people were Monterrey, Guadalajara, Mexico City, and Cancun.

On Mexico's Caribbean coast, Cancun, Cozumel, and the Riviera Maya are abuzz with tourists and meeting delegates alike who make time for snorkeling, diving, shopping, and even a trip to see nearby archaeological ruins.

Extending south along the coast to Tulum, Riviera Maya is filled with some 40 hotels for meetings and 30,000 hotel rooms. Culture and history are two draws to Mexico's interior, from Mexico City to quaint colonial cities such as Morelia, San Miguel de Allende, and Guanajuato.

Guadalajara in the midst of a building boom with the addition of more than 2,000 hotel rooms in the last year. Expo Guadalajara, with nearly 500,000 square feet of function space, is undergoing a renovation and expansion project that will add more than 150,000 square feet by November 2008.

Monterrey, another meetings hub, offers Convex Center and the new Lewis Exhibition Center. Chihuahua is home to the Chihuahua Exposition and Convention Center, and Puebla, home to the Puebla Convention Center, plans to debut a new convention and exhibition center in 2009. In the state of Yucatan, Merida offers 5,000 guest rooms and the Century 21 Exposition and Convention Center.

Economic Benefits

Planners at the one-day event learned that Mexico offers more than 3,100 luxury hotels with 245,000-plus rooms, and 52 exhibition centers with 3.7 million square feet of meeting space and 2.2 million square feet of convention space. They also learned that Web-based Meetings Online allows them to review meeting and convention options throughout the country, expediting the planning process. Plus, RFPs can be submitted online, enabling planners to get immediate assistance.

An infrastructure that supports meetings and conventions is complemented by two different and attractive tax incentives. Mexico's zero-tax program, which eliminates the value-added tax (VAT) for international meetings and conventions, continues to be a cost-saving benefit for groups. Everything related to value-added for the meeting is included in this exemption, including lodging, host and hostesses, and audiovisual.

"We want to promote Mexico as a part of the North American region. As part of NAFTA (North America Free Trade Agreement), meeting planners or associations that organize business in Mexico are able to deduct their meeting expenses," explained Eduardo Chaillo, CMP, CMM, director of the strategic business unit for the United States and Canada, Mexico Tourism Board.

The latest official statistics reveal that during the first seven months of this year, Mexico welcomed 13 million tourists, who generated an income of $7.9 billion. With all the new developments taking place - and initiatives such as "Association Day" to market the country's assets - those figures will only continue to rise.

Andrea Doyle is Convene's senior writer. Meetings Made Easy in Mexico is sponsored by Mexico Tourism. Visit its Web site at www.visitmexico.com, where you may now also complete your RFP, by clicking on the Meeting and Incentive Planners section.