Past events
All eventsWorld Impact Summit
2 days of meetings and exchanges around concrete solutions to respond to the climate emergency, 5,000 professionals present, round tables, talks, live shows, workshops and a Solutions Village.
This year, the main issue is the preservation of water and oceans, in support of the sustainable development goals 6 "Clean water and sanitation" and 14 "Aquatic life".
After a 2020 edition dedicated to biodiversity, this year’s World Impact Summit will have water as its “Great Cause”.
The organizers started from the recognition that the preservation of water resources is a truly universal issue, as recent events have demonstrated: floods, drought, pollution, shortage, overexploitation. Considering also that this issue is insufficiently mentioned in the dynamics of transition, water is placed in the spotlight this year in order to anchor its central importance in the ongoing changes. Thus, the wish, in the spirit of this international summit of solutions, is to find concrete solutions to preserve our water resources. This aspect of the event is also carried out with the Adour-Garonne water agency.
The sub-topics will be well-known topics of IFGR: governance and management of watersheds, sanitation and water quality, wastewater reuse, nature-based solutions (see the conference with Erik Orsenna, president of IAGF on this topic at the World Conservation Congress in Marseille in September 2021), raising awareness of economic actors in water management, restoration of aquatic systems, transition in water uses.
IAGF will intervene during this summit, notably on the relationship between rivers and biodiversity during a roundtable on Nature-Based Solutions, based on the lessons learned from the Yellow River during the 9th international session of IAGF in China in 2019, and on our experience on the Rhône river.
This roundtable will take place on December 3rd at 2.30 pm at the Agora Eau.
Four themes will be highlighted during this summit in addition to freshwater which is the “great cause”:
- Goal Zero Carbon
- Circular Economy
- Recovery through territories
- Nature & Biodiversity
These themes will be addressed with a particular focus on water resources, and more specifically on freshwater, “the lowest common denominator of all forms of terrestrial life”, in the words of the event’s founder, Nicolas Pereira. One of the major objectives of the World Impact Summit is to “deconstruct the walls between actors and between ecosystems”, particularly in the water sector.
In addition to the conferences, the event also includes a Solutions Exhibition Village and a “Solutions Competition” to reward and promote the best solutions emerging from the territories that contribute to the ecological, energy and social transition. Three prizes will be awarded: a “Start Impact” prize for start-ups, an “Impact Up” prize for SMEs, and a “special water” prize for the best solution for the protection of water resources according to the SDGs 6 and 14.