Reed Exhibitions MD brings wealth of expertise to African Tourism Board

Carol-Weaving
Carol-Weaving
Avatar of Linda Hohnholz
Written by Linda Hohnholz

Carol Weaving, Managing Director of Reed Exhibitions South Africa, has joined the African Tourism Board (ATB). She will serve on the Board of Private Sector Tourism Leaders, South Africa, and the Steering Committee, UK.

In November 2013, Reed Exhibitions, the worldโ€™s largest and most respected exhibition company and part of the RELX Group, signed a joint venture agreement with the Thebe Tourism Group and Carol to acquire a majority share in Thebe Exhibitions & Projects Group (TEPG). TEPG was renamed Thebe Reed Exhibitions and was owned 60% by Reed Exhibitions, 30% by Thebe Tourism Group, with Carol Weaving retaining 10% as Managing Director.

Three years later and a desire for accelerated growth, Reed bought out Thebeโ€™s shares and now Thebe Reed is Carol Weaving.

New board members have been joining ATB before the upcoming soft launch of the association taking place on Monday, November 5, at 1400 hours during World Travel Market in London.

200 top tourism leaders, including ministers from many African countries, as well as Dr. Taleb Rifai, former UNWTO Secretary General, are scheduled to attend the event at WTM.

Click here to find out more about the African Tourism Board meeting on November 5 and to register.

Carol brings to Reed Exhibitions, a diverse working background in the business, tourism, and events industry. For over 30 years, Carolโ€™s career has expanded through many sectors within the industry, and her knowledge and expertise spans across marketing, exhibition management, events, and conferences as well as venue and facility management.

After growing up in the United Kingdom and working as the Marketing Manager for a radio station, Carol pursued her dream of living in South Africa and became the youngest Director (age 29) of the Automobile Association at the Kyalami Racetrack which equipped her with the skillset she would soon need to start her own company, International Exhibition Consultants. Carol later sold a majority share of this company to Dutch exhibition company RAI, and then proceeded to head up RAI in South Africa.

As the South African economy grew and expanded over her time at RAI, she realized a need to team up with an empowerment partner and proceeded to facilitate a buy-out of RAIโ€™s shares to the Thebe Tourism group in 2004, a subsidiary of South Africaโ€™s first Black Empowerment Company, Thebe Investment Corporation.

Thanks to Carolโ€™s continued passion, hard work, dedication, and management, Reed Exhibitions is one of the largest and most successful exhibition and venue management companies in Southern Africa and is now in a position to grow its footprint across the African continent with many new ventures in the pipeline.

The group owns major exhibition titles such as Africa Travel Week โ€“ International Luxury Travel Market Africa (ILTM Africa); Incentives, Business Travel & Meetings Africa (ibtm Africa); World Travel Market Africa (WTM Africa); Sports and Events Tourism Exchange; Africa Automation Fair; Connected Industries; #Buy a Business Expo; Decorex Joburg; Cape Town and Durban; 100% Design South Africa; Mediatech Africa; Small Business Expo; International Sourcing Fair; Value Added Agriculture West Africa; SMART Factories; FIBO Business Summit; Fire & Feast Meat Festival; and Comic Con Africa. The group also offers strategic venue management solutions and its contract to manage the award-winning Ticketpro Dome in Johannesburg, on behalf of its owners โ€“ the Sasol Pension Fund, stretches until 2024.

Carol is the past Chairperson of the Exhibition Association of Southern Africa (EXSA) and current Chairperson of the Association of African Exhibition Organizers (AAXO). She also served on the International Association of Exhibitions and Events (IAEE) committee.

ABOUT THE AFRICAN TOURISM BOARD

Founded in 2018, the African Tourism Board (ATB) is an association that is internationally acclaimed for acting as a catalyst for the responsible development of travel and tourism to and from the African region. Theย  African Tourism Board is part of theย International Coalition of Tourism Partners (ICTP).

The Association provides aligned advocacy, insightful research, and innovative events to its members.

In partnership with private and public sector members, ATB enhances the sustainable growth, value, and quality of travel and tourism to, from, and within Africa. The Association provides leadership and counsel on an individual and collective basis toย its member organizations. ATB is rapidly expanding opportunities for marketing, public relations, investments, branding, promoting, and establishing niche markets.

For more information on the African Tourism Board, click here.ย  To join ATB, click here.

 

 

About the author

Avatar of Linda Hohnholz

Linda Hohnholz

Editor in chief for eTurboNews based in the eTN HQ.

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