At the recent International Convention & Congress Association (ICCA) Annual Congress in Montevideo, Uruguay, Rochelle Kempton was recognised as “ICAA Hot Leader of the Year for 2005”.

Ms Kempton is Director of Sales and Marketing for the Cairns Convention Centre in Australia.

In making the presentation, ICCA’s Chief Executive Martin Sirk said “this award was implemented to recognise the individual who consistently supplied the highest quality data to our research team and so most helped us maintain ICCA data as the world’s best source of information on international association events".

“The award is chosen by our front line team and represents a big peer-to-peer thank you for Rochelle Kempton’s valuable contribution to the ongoing success of our organisation”, Mr Sirk said.

On accepting the award, Ms Kempton said she was absolutely delighted to have been chosen as this year’s winner and that it was further acknowledgement of Cairns’ increasing profile as a serious international convention destination.

“At the Cairns Convention Centre, we are consistent users of ICCA data in identifying prospective clients but also believe it is important in return to provide the research team in Amsterdam with as much information and assistance as we can”, Ms Kempton said.

The Cairns Convention Centre is managed by Ogden IFC who also operate the Kuala Lumpur, Brisbane and Darwin Convention Centres.