Sustanability@ISDRS2018
————————
ISDRS 2018 Sustainability Strategy
International meetings, events and conferences are very important business practices that promote efficient and fruitful exchange, debate and sharing of knowledge, ideas and solutions as well as the creation and strengthening of networks. Due to their significant and noticeable benefits, several events have been organized to bring together hundreds of participants from every part of the world for a certain number of days.
However, these events can cause significant negative environmental impactsthrough energy and water consumption, waste generation and pollution of air and water. The organization of the event and the travel of the participants can contribute to climate change by creating greenhouse gas emissions. Moreover, positive impacts in economic and social terms are not always taken for granted.
In this context, the Organizing Committee of the ISDRS 2018 Conferencebelieves that a conference on sustainability should incorporate sustainability considerations in all phases of planning and managing the event. Pursuing this general aim, the Organizing Committee of the ISDRS 2018 Conference has developed a sustainability strategy called Sustainability@ISDRS2018 which incorporates several organizational programs with the objective to provide the most sustainable event possible. Incorporating sustainability considerations into the event planning and management will minimize the potential negative environmental impacts and maximize the positive ones, including creating a positive image for the event and social benefits for the local community.
The main goals of the ISDRS 2018 Sustainability Strategy are:
- to identify the sustainability priorities that the Organizing Committee of the ISDRS 2018 Conferencecan directly manage in order to plan and implement simple yet effective sustainability practices;
- to guide and engage stakeholders, such as participants, staff and contracted services to follow these sustainability practices;
- to continue creating know-how on sustainability management for future ISDRS conferences.
The development process of the ISDRS 2018 Sustainability Strategy can be divided in five stages:
- creating and communicating the ISDRS 2018 Sustainability Policy;
- identifying the areas of impact that are the sustainability priorities to focus on;
- developing sustainability objectives for these focus areas;
- transforming objectives into actions by defining sustainability practices and arrangements;
- measuring the actions against objectives in order to evaluate the efforts to make the event as sustainable as possible.
ISDRS 2018 Sustainability Policy
The Organizing Committee of the 24thAnnual Conference of the International Sustainable Development Research Society, ISDRS 2018 is committed to adopting and promoting sustainable practices in event planning and management as much as possible, in order to reduce the negative environmental impacts and improve the positive economic and social impacts of the conference through the implementation of this sustainability policy.
A conference of this size always affects the environment due to the number of people participating in the conference. However, given the resources and possibilities available to the organizers, actions to reduce the negative impact on the environment and be socially responsible in a way that can be directly managed by the organizers will be promoted. This also means encouraging partners to act in a sustainable way.
Sustainability@ISDRS2018 is based on the following fundamental sustainability priorities:
- reduce the impact connected to the conference venue: location, buildings & equipment;
- reduce the impact connected to transport activities directly controlled by the organizers;
- reduce the impact connected to catering activities directly controlled by the organizers;
- reduce the impact connected to materials use and consumption directly controlled by the organizers;
- estimate the climate compensation needed for the Conference activities.
By setting up a sustainability policy, we also aim to leave a lasting positive legacy for future ISDRS conferences through the development of know-how for effective implementation of sustainability principles and practices.
This sustainability policy, and the connected strategy, will be disclosed and communicated throughout all the Conference media before, during and after the event and also takes gender, religious and cultural diversity into consideration.
ISDRS 2018 Sustainability Priorities
