Lasting impact

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How high are your ambitions?

To support your efforts in working with Lasting Impact we have put together a list of key actions you can take. Consider these a starting point. A guide, and not a final checklist. It is meant to get you started on building your own list of actions and help you meet your sustainability ambitions.

High ambitions

If you have high ambitions in Lasting Impact you can commit to following:

Adopting sustainability as a purpose in our vision statement, lifting sustainability from a means of planning to and end goal of the organisation.
Designing the event around well-defined legacy goals to ensure it leaves a lasting positive impact on the destination (Copenhagen Legacy Lab).
Define and set clear sustainability demands in all future event RFPs.
Educating staff in the event organisation in sustainability approaches, including for event planning.
Facilitate that international experts and speakers can meet and/or teach local students in the field.
Create an inspiration guide for the sector on how to work with the Sustainable Development Goals. Have a look at the Copenhagen Congress Compass and the SDG's for your event.
Give feedback and advise to local vendors on their sustainability offer to allow then to improve.
Host a policy forum for local politicians and stakeholders inspiring positive policy change.
Distribute learning from the conference to developing countries.
Plant a tree for each delegate.
Think sustainable event planning as an opportunity to redesign your strategy, review the resource flow, go through the value chain, redesign the brand experience, influence people and nature through choices of products and materials, empower your community and report on your lasting impact.
Take responsibility for your participants’ choices by making sustainable products and services accessible and by working with behavioral design.
Set goals, targets and KPI's, and measure them.

Medium ambitions

If you have medium ambitions in Lasting Impact you can commit to following:

Adopting sustainability as a strategic goal and guiding principle in future event planning.
Create best-practice suggestions for how to design the next conference in a sustainable way.
Educating all staff in the event organisation in sustainable event planning.
Inspire other event organisations to follow your sustainability path.
Give feedback and advise to local vendors on their sustainability offer to allow then to improve.
Create a public awareness campaign in conection to the congress to facilitate behavioural change.

Modest ambitions

If you have modest ambitions in Lasting Impact you can commit to following:

Use the lessons learned from this guide when planning your future events.
Recommend other event organisations to use the guide.
Give feedback and advise to local vendors on their sustainability offer to allow then to improve.
Create a space at the event for talent, business and investors to connect, inspiring innovation and sustainable growth.

Why is it important

In this guide we have so far addressed the footprint of the event itself and the carbon footprint left behind by participants due to travel, accommodation and consumption. However, to truly make the event a driver of sustainable development, you must take a step further by actively inspiring participants and vendors to commit to sustainability on a local and global level. Key questions to ask yourself are:

How do we ensure that sustainability becomes the default approach of our organisation when planning events in the future?
How do we ensure that all our staff is knowledgeable enough about sustainability to make qualified choices?
How do we inspire others in the industry to systematically adopt sustainable event management?
How do we inspire our own participants, exhibitors and sponsors to embrace sustainable practices?

Working with lasting impact in Copenhagen:

Copenhagen Convention Bureau (CVB) works with a wide range of stakeholders including the meetings industry, the city of Copenhagen, scientific organisations, alliances, academic institutions and companies, and will be happy to put you in touch with relevant contacts. Read more here.
CVB has launched the Copenhagen Legacy Lab, an initiative that gives international associations the opportunity to realise their organisational visions and to achieve their specific goals. Regardless of whether you are looking to define your own Legacy goals or simply to be inspired, feel free to contact CVB for more information or visit the Copenhagen Legacy Lab website.
Find innovative ways to make outreach activities a part of your event as a way to make a positive lasting impact. This can for instance be done by encouraging participants to engage with local communities and cultures where relevant, or by inviting locals to take part in event activities. Read more about how Copenhageners and visitors can mutually benefit from meeting each other, concept described as Localhood in Wonderful Copenhagen’s Sustainability strategy.

Next steps:

You have now reached the end of the guide and are hopefully feel inspired to take direct sustainability actions when planning future events.

For a full overview of guide’s suggested actions you can download the summary pdf below. You can also browse through “Sustainable Copenhagen” for more information about why Copenhagen is the ideal location for your next sustainable event. We also invite you to visit our toolbox for setting your sustainability ambitions.

We wish you the best of luck and would love to get your feedback on the guide. What works and what doesn’t? How can we improve it?

Good luck!