Late October 2009 saw the launch of the Event Greening Forum, which was established to promote and embrace sustainable investment principles within the meetings, incentives, conferences and events industry in South Africa. This development was supported and accepted by a group of role players in the industry.

In his opening speech, Rashid Toefy, CEO of the CTICC (and one of the sponsors of the event), stressed how important it is for the industry to realise its responsibility in the fight against the effects of global warming and climate change. “We have to be innovative and make sure that we understand the full concept of sustainability.  Event greening is not just about the environment, but also about the financial and social responsibilities.  People, planet and profit,” he said. 

All working groups agreed at the inaugural workshop that the industry needs a central point from where it can extract information and get support and guidelines for hosting sustainable events.

The following main objectives have been identified for the Event Greening Forum:

• To be industry driven and have mandated representatives from main industry role players;
• To set minimum standards around event greening within the industry;
• To determine baselines that can be used to set specific targets and timelines for event greening and encourage measurement and evaluation;
• To raise awareness and promote training opportunities for event greening principles and practices;
• To ensure appropriate marketing and branding to promote event greening principles and practices;
• To provide a platform for sharing information and best practice around event greening principles and practices;
• To work towards a common understanding that can help to integrate current greening initiatives and role players, rather than develop an independent entity;
• To work initially as a voluntary system, but encourage appropriate regulation;
• To promote communication with government and encourage it to adopt and promote event greening processes, standards and regulations;
• To raise funds to ensure the long sustainability of the forum; and
• To “walk the talk” through actions.

The following main sectors have been identified:

• Professional conference organisers (PCOs); meetings, incentives, conferences and events (MICE) organisations; destination marketing organisations (DMOs)
• Exhibition and events organisers
• Suppliers and sub-contractors (infrastructure, AV, transport, products, etc)
• Venues

Major role players (SAACI, EXSA, TPSA) represented at the Event Greening Forum inaugural workshop have given their initial support for mandated involvement, as well as dissemination of information within their structure. These organisations will be invited for more comment through their national structures.

The following associations and organisations have been identified as some of the strategic partners in this forum:

• GMIC – Green Meeting Industry Council
• IFEA – International Federation of Events Association
• MICE – Meetings Incentives Conferences and Events Association
• FEDHASA – Federated Hospitality Industry of South Africa
• SITE – Society of Incentive Travel Executives
• SATSA – South African Tourism Services Association
• GBCSA – Green Building Council of South Africa
• GreenStaySA
• Government structures
• Labour within the events industry
• NEEA – National Energy Efficiency Agency

A working committee was formed and will meet in November again to discuss the way forward for 2010. 

Interested parties can request more information or a copy of the first concept document by e-mailing This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it or contacting Justin Hawes (082 570 7280) or Karin Diederichs (083 270 9219).