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As South Africans grit their teeth in the final dash to complete infrastructure and stadiums in time for the 2010 World Soccer Cup, we do so with increasing national pride and we speak sagely of long term benefits to our economy. Of course we have our prophets of doom but they would do well to look at another sector that has benefited from the foresight and courage of those who were prepared to invest well into the future - the developers of our conference and convention centres whose efforts have proved a boon to business tourism.

Yes, I know that international conferencing has took a knock last quarter but, when the green shoots turn to little shrubs and the spin off from the 2010 branding kick in, we can rest assured that conferencing will continue to contribute meaningfully to our inflow of foreign revenues. At last count South Africa was hosting about 800 international conference events annually.

Today we have world class venues, capable of hosting major international conferences, in Cape Town, Durban and Johannesburg. Others are planned for Pretoria (Tshwane) in Gauteng, Port Elizabeth and Bloemfontein. There are, bbeieve, close to 2000 other conferencing venues across the country.

The Durban ICC (international conference centre) was the first in the stable of major venues when it opened in 1997. (Does anyone out there remember the heady excitement when SA hosted the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002?)

But, it was at least a decade earlier, during another recession and our days of international isolation, that a Durban City Council delegation returned from an overseas mission convinced that conferencing was the way to go. From then on it was an issue high on the council's forward planning agenda. In fact the likes of Sybil Hotz, Margaret Ambler, Peter Mansfield, Margaret Winter and other councillors of the day should be honoured for their foresight.

Notably, the first in our national stable of ICCs was the Durban venue. Developed by the municipality at a cost of R280 million, it is rated as one of the most advanced conference facilities in the world. Technology-driven, it is designed for maximum flexibility and versatility and has for the past six years been rated Africa's leading convention centre by World Travel Awards. Five years ago it was also ranked as one of the top 10 conference centres in the world by the International Association of Congress Centres.

The purpose-built, fully air-conditioned centre's three convention halls are interlinked. Moveable walls allow for a number of different venue configurations or the halls can be opened up to form one large venue with seating 7000m square metres of floor space that can accommodate 5000 seated delegates. Its sister venue, the Durban Exhibition Centre, doubles the capacity to accommodate
10 000 delegates. The two centres become "one' when Walnut Road, a brick-paved concourse between them, is closed.

Next to step up to the international conference plate was the Sandton Convention Centre. Part of Tsogo Sun's casino bid commitment to the Gauteng Gambling Board was to invest in the centre. The R400 million, 12 storey edifice cost R400 million by the time it opened in 2000.

Conveniently linked by sky-walk to Sandton City and adjacent to Nelson Mandela Square, the centre boasts the latest state-of-the-art facilities with in-house technology partners offering infra-red simultaneous translation systems, ISDN, asynchronous digital subscriber lines (ADSL) and wireless Internet broadband connectivity (Wi-Fi) and satellite broadcasting.

It offers more than 22 000 square metres of meeting, exhibition and special-event space. Multiple events can be staged simultaneously on four levels and up to 10 000 visitors can be accommodated.

For some reason the fact that it has 26 escalators seems to capture the public imagination and perhaps there is real comfort in knowing that the building can be evacuated in a matter of minutes, should the alarm system go off.

Others are more impressed by the triple-volume ballroom with its vast, uninterrupted space and immense hand-woven wall coverings.

For four consecutive years the SCC has received the EXSA Excellence Award for Best Exhibitions Venue The two exhibition levels have a combined floor space of 10 000m², and each level has separate access to street level docking and loading areas.

Among the most notable events it has hosted is the Miss World pageant 2008. after political unrest on Russia's border with Georgia forced organisers to move it. Last year it also staged the Southern African Development Community (SADC) Heads of State and Government Summit.

Last but, certainly not least, Cape Town's ICC opened its doors in 2003 and, once again, we find that the municipality was the largest shareholder. The venue, with all the advantages of the city's favoured destination status, now enjoys the highest international rating for a SA conference venue.

More recently Convenco, the centre's management company, learned that the Customs House site across the freeway was available. Now the existing 11 200 square meters will be nearly doubled by another 10 000 square metre extension. Interestingly, the provincial Department of Works, which owns the new site, has been persuaded to form a historic partnership that goes well beyond the sale or lease of the land.

The extension should be ready early next year and will entail a mixed development accessible from the existing centre via a direct link under the highway. In a near-mirror image of the existing centre it will comprise both exhibition and some office space with parking and a major new hotel. There will also be new banqueting space overlooking Table Bay.

Convenco's managing director, Dirk Elzinga, says the new building will attract large international congresses, while accommodating repeat clients whose events grow from year to year. It seems that the size of the current venue has inhibited growth.

But architectural aficionados are quick to point out that the iconic building, which has won several design awards, is more than the sum of its conferencing parts. Professor Anya van der Merwe Miszewski, a multi award winner herself, was the lead architect and is known for interpreting the unique needs of each client and each site within a physical, cultural and environmental context. Her firm formed an association Revel Fox and Partners, Lucien Le Grange Architect & Urban Planner, Stauch Vorster Architects (Cape Town), ACG Architects & Development Planners, dhk Architects and Magqwaka Associates Architects. They called called themselves Foreshore Architects and are also responsible for the "Custom House" extension.

Well, those are the leaders in the pack but it would be remiss of me not to doff a cap at good old Sun City, the product of yet another visionary, Sol Kerzner and host to an impressive number of major conferences.