Later this month, the retail property market will descend on Cannes for the 19th Mapic. Hailed as the only professional trade show dedicated to retail real estate on a global scale.

Later this month, the retail property market will descend on Cannes for the 19th Mapic. Hailed as the only professional trade show dedicated to retail real estate on a global scale, this is the place to identify the best locations worldwide and find out about emerging territories.

To coincide with the annual event, this November’s Retail Week Property supplement has a global slant as we focus on some of the most promising retail markets in the world and the opportunities that abound.

Since the onset of the financial crisis in 2008, financing has been in short supply around Europe. This year, that’s slowly changing as returning investor confidence results in an influx of overseas money into European shopping centre development. In the first half of this year, interest was up in the crisis-hit countries of Greece, Ireland, Italy and Portugal as attractive pricing drew in investors. Meanwhile, markets such as the UK, Benelux and the Czech Republic are starting to see rising tenant demand.

We look further East at some of the biggest mega-projects in the world. Schemes that were shelved in 2008 are back under construction with completion dates attached, and more big mall projects are coming to market in Russia, the Middle East and even further afield.

Closer to home and the prospect of retail property development is less assured as a delay in the Government’s next rates revaluation puts the brakes on landlord investment. Our report examines the impact postponing the planned 2015 business rates revaluation by two years will have on occupancy rates and potential high street investment. With the UK’s business rates the highest property taxes of any EU country, it’s apparent that a reform is needed to allow all retailers to share a level playing field.

But it’s not all doom and gloom for UK retailers, who could be eligible to claw back tens of millions of pounds lost in leasing errors and miscalculations. We look at how property auditing is becoming an increasingly vital lifeline for retailers paying higher property costs than agreed because of errors in the administration process.

Also featured in our UK coverage is a report on how retailers are reaping the financial rewards from getting their existing warehouses up to scratch. We reveal how improving their sustainable credentials is paying dividends for those retailers pushing the green agenda.

Technological investment is similarly high on retailers’ agenda as digital innovations help track the impact of experiential activity on shopper behaviour. The analysis reveals how a grasp of new technology and advanced digital capabilities is making the measurement of the effectiveness of such experiences a much more exact science.

As physical and digital commerce collides in retail markets around the world, understanding the bigger global picture has never been more essential.

  • Laura Heywood, Supplements Editor