Successful Meetings - November 2009 - (Page 10)

NEWS UPDATE Spain Hosts MITM Euromed Northern city of Oviedo a hit with attendees Going Green Globally U.N. Promotes Virtual Events as Green uring its first virtual event, the International Telecommunications Union (ITU), a United Nations agency, called on the U.N. to include information and communication technologies (ICTs)—such as virtual meetings—in its efforts to fight global warming. The ITU event, the Virtual Symposium on ICTs and Climate Change, attracted 500 remote participants from 50 countries, with speakers and moderators from China, India, Korea, Sweden, the United States, and Vietnam, among others. Its purpose was to demonstrate the important role that ICTs can play in combating climate change, and to advocate for the inclusion of ICTs in the Copenhagen Agreement, a global text on climate change that’s currently being prepared by the U.N. “Information technologies contribute 2 to 3 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. But they can also reduce emissions in other sectors by at least 15 percent,” U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon said during the symposium. “By harnessing the power of ICTs we have saved hundreds of tons of CO2,” Malcolm Johnson, director of ITU’s Telecommunication Standardization Bureau, said. “When we consider that every week there are conferences involving thousands of participants, virtual events such as this would have a huge impact on —Matt Alderton emissions.” Ramon Alvarez, president of GSAR Marketing, Oviedo City Councilwoman Belen Fernandez Acevedo, and Fernando Corral, vice president of the Oviedo Travel and Tourism Enterprises Club, at the MITM Euromed press conference M eetings and Incentive Travel Market (MITM) Euromed took place in Oviedo, in northern Spain, September 28-29. The 13th MITM Euromed event achieved great success, even as it was hosted by a relatively unknown city. “We were a little bit concerned that Oviedo, which is not well known in the MICE industry, would not attract a large number of buyers. We were wrong,” noted Ramon Alvarez, president and managing director of GSAR Marketing, which produces MITM Euromed and MITM Americas. In fact, organizers received more than 200 registration requests from interested buyers; they had to close I SM I November 2009 I SuccessfulMeetings.com http://www.SuccessfulMeetings.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Successful Meetings - November 2009

Successful Meetings - November 2009
Contents
Editor's Letter
Spain Hosts MITM Euromed
Meetings Law
Incentive Insights
Management Matters
Mouth For Sale
Golf Meetings
Corporate Social Responsibility
Places + Spaces
International Roundup
Paris
Hong Kong
Scotland
Colombia
Mexico
London
Copenhagen
Switzerland
Las Vegas
Dallas
Boston
Bermuda

Successful Meetings - November 2009