AEO sustainability commitments

Introduction

Sustainability forms a part of all areas of the business; it is integral to the venue’s strategy and culture, is included in all processes and procedures and is understood and implemented by all staff. This is underpinned by a clear sustainability policy.

The aim is for AEO, AEV and ESSA association members to work towards a consistent base level of sustainability performance. These commitments were created to give all parties a clear vision and allow members to track and compare their progress.

Each commitment is divided into one or more principle

The principles are designed:

to provide guidance for all to ensure they are implementing a basic level of sustainability

to help identify any areas needing particular focus

• Resources such as eGuide content, case studies, templates and guidance documents are available to help association members achieve the principles of the commitments

• Members self-score using scoring system (available in the member zone)

• Members of the cross association sustainability working group feed back progress during group meetings and offer mutual support

A little background

In January 2019 the group and vice chairs of the cross association sustainability working group compiled short and long-term objectives for commitments to help reduce the event industry’s impact on the environment.

One objective was to:

Develop a self-scoring system of sustainability commitments that each member can mark themselves against with no deadline of achievement

Olympia London offered to fund The MICE Machine to hold two workshops at Informa PLC London. The MICE Machine assisted Olympia London in forming their ‘Grand Plan’ sustainability strategy having facilitated a complete review of the scope of Olympia London’s sustainability efforts, including a thorough, practical assessment of the venue’s achievements and opportunities for improvement, strategy workshops for a group of champions drawn from each department in the organisation and the development of objectives and actions for them to achieve.

March 2019	The initial workshop explored the concepts of sustainability for each industry sector; splitting into venue, supplier and organiser groups to focus thinking and then collaborate on direction of travel(?).
April 2019	A sub group formed to condense the number of outputs from the first workshop into viable principles, split by venues, suppliers and organisers using Informa’s fundamentals as a guide.
August 2019	A closing workshop to finalise the commitments

The cross association sustainability working group compiled a set of commitments tailored to AEO, AEV and ESSA for members to follow and track progress.

An industry initiative to address climate change.

At COP (Conference of the Parties) 26 in November 2021, world leaders met to present how their countries will achieve the 50% reduction in carbon emissions by 2030 to deliver on the Paris Agreement.

The Net Zero Carbon Events Pledge was launched setting out the events industry’s commitment to play its role in addressing climate change.

The associations have a part to play in ensuring our members have the support and insight they need to work towards meeting the industry pledge.

The Net Zero Roadmap for Events was launched at COP 27, creating a common framework for all event industry stakeholders to meet the net zero goal providing a pathway for individual organisations as well as industry-wide action areas.

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