The 8th International Scientific Congress ICONBEST 2022 was held today, which is traditionally organized every two years by the University of Tourism and Management from Skopje. This year, the Faculty of Tourism and Hospitality Management in Opatija at the University of Rijeka, Croatia, the Faculty of Economics at the University of Osijek, Croatia, the University of Oradea, Romania, the Faculty of Applied Ecology at the Metropolitan University, Serbia, and the Academy for applied technical and preschool studies, Vranje, Serbia.

At this year's congress on "Innovative trends in international business and sustainable management", prof. PhD. Zoran Ivanovski, who emphasized the importance and necessity of innovation and sustainable management in achieving market competitiveness, especially after the tectonic changes caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. Prof. PhD. Slobodan Ivanovic from the Faculty of Management in Tourism and Hospitality from Osijek at the University of Rijeka, Croatia, in the plenary address at the opening of the Congress, emphasized that precisely personalized tourist services with rich content, but at the same time meeting high hygiene and health standards are what tourists are looking for today, after the pandemic, which requires a lot of creativity and innovation in the approach.

At the congress, the participants exchanged their scientific knowledge concerning, among other things, the franchise as a business model, the improvement of the investment climate, the digital adaptation of the business processes of companies, especially in response to the challenges imposed by the pandemic, branding as a function of development of the tourist offer, analyzes and perspectives of different types of tourism, such as ecological or religious tourism, new forms of organizational action, and in many other areas related to the theme of the Congress. They also presented the best practices for improving the business climate in the region and beyond, and had the opportunity to establish business contacts among themselves in the scientific areas covered by the Congress.

The participants of the Congress made several important conclusions. They evaluated fashion franchising as a potential model for the growth of domestic fashion companies, and regarding the consequences of the Covid pandemic, they concluded that it changed the attitude and behavior of society, imposing the need to adopt new technologies. Business leaders were told that they should focus on sustainable and inclusive growth by integrating innovation and employee-centric management into business processes to keep their companies competitive in the market. The entire agenda of the Congress as well as the abstracts of the exhibited scientific articles are available on the website of ICONBEST ’22 on  https://iconbest.utms.edu.mk/.