May 27th – 30th, APacCHRIE 2025 were held in Chiang Mai, Thailand, which attracted many experts, academics, teachers and students from universities and the industry representatives from all over the world to explore the cutting-edge issues in the field of hospitality, catering and education.
The Department of Integrated Resort and Tourism Management of the University of Macau also organized a strong delegation of students and faculty members to actively participate in the conference, including Associate Professor Lawrence Hoc Nang FONG, Associate Professor Yuansi HOU and Associate Professor Glenn James MCCARTNEY, Associate Professor Amy Siu Ian SO, Assistant Professor Jacey Ja Young CHOE, Assistant Professor Faye Feier CHEN and Assistant Professor Soey Sut Ieng LEI.
Among them, Prof. Lawrence Hoc Nang FONG, Prof. Amy Siu Ian SO, Prof. Jacey Ja Young CHOE and Prof. Soey Sut Ieng LEI were also invited to participate in the board meeting as members of the APacCHRIE Association.
At the opening ceremony of the conference, Prof.Lawrence Hoc Nang FONG, as the President of APacCHRIE, delivered a welcome remark, extending a warm welcome to the participants from all over the world and emphasizing the significance of the conference in promoting academic exchanges and cooperation in the field of hospitality and catering and education in the Asia-Pacific region.
During the conference, a number of faculty members and students from the Department of Integrated Resort and Tourism Management actively participated in the conference. Prof. Yuansi HOU, Prof. Jacey Ja Young CHOE, and PhD students Gaobiao CAO gave a speech on the impact of noise on the virtual museum experience, work balance, and customer satisfaction, respectively, which provided new perspectives and ideas for research in related fields.
Prof. Faye Feier CHEN, PhD students Chufeng WANG and Qiao ZHANG also presented their research results through elaborate posters and lively lectures in the poster session.
In addition, Prof. Soey Sut Ieng LEI was the moderator of the panel discussion session. She and the many participants had a lively discussion on the core topic of the vision for the future of the hotel industry, which facilitated the collision and fusion of different viewpoints, and provided useful references and suggestions for the future development of the hotel industry.
The Asia-Pacific Council on Hotel, Restaurant, and Institutional Education (APacCHRIE), as one of the federations of the International CHRIE, is the leading hospitality and tourism education association within the Asia–Pacific Region. The active performance of the faculty and student delegation of the Department of Integrated Resort and Tourism Management at the conference not only demonstrated the academic strength and research level of the department in this field, but also provided a valuable platform for the faculty and students to communicate and cooperate with their counterparts at home and abroad, which helped to further enhance the influence of the department in the international academic community, and to promote the development of academic research and education in the related fields to a new level.
