Corporate event organisers have pledged their support for the event industry’s framework on climate change, which was agreed at the COP26 conference last week. As well as representatives from across the industry’s global associations, ICE (in-house Corporate Events) presented the voice of the corporate buyer, who impressed the importance of collaboration between corporates, venues and agencies.
As well as representatives from the UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change), JMIC (Joint Industry Meetings Council) and the Scottish Event Campus, Anita Howard, founder and CEO of ICE was joined by Stephanie DuBois, Operations Director, SAP, and five other representatives from the organisations’ community.
“It was a really important and inspirational meeting, with some of the biggest names in the industry all commiting to make big changes to our industry,” commented Anita. “Our corporates represented the thinking behind most businesses and brands and were 100% behind these changes and are really keen to move this agenda forward.”
“Transparancy will be crucial,” continued Anita. “This is a group where measurement has moved up the agenda at the same speed as sustainability; they need action and proof points that show their businesses how events can positively contribute to their businesses own sustainable goals.”
The aim of the meeting was to set in place a framework for the events industry to better measure, manage and set goals for more sustainable events; its inclusion as part of the official COP26 program underlines the importance of the discussion and adds further credibility to its findings.
The next steps for the Net Zero Carbon in Events initiative is to develop a detailed roadmap on how we will achieve the targets. ICE will be forming a Corporate Planner Sustainability Task Force which will feed into the UNFCCC & JMIC plan.
The meeting took place at COP’26 at the Scottish Event Campus, on 10 November 2021. ICE is also encouraging #eventprofs to share their own little sustainable ideas here to help change the C02 emissions from events.
