Abena is the CEO of Legacy, a sustainable events agency and consultancy that helps companies run events that are better for the environment. She is also on the Leadership team of the Sustainable Event Alliance. Abena organises sustainable events on behalf of clients and trains event professionals on how to incorporate sustainability into their event designs and processes. She has been working in sustainability for 15 years and has helped clients across the world with understanding the carbon footprints of their events, their environmental impact and their potential for positive social change.

Before a short period as head of membership development at The Corporate IT Forum, Alden had been in a senior position within the Client Services team at the Media Industry’s Industry body the Audit Bureau of Circulation (ABC) for 14 years, embracing the move from traditional print to digital offerings. Providing a conduit between ABC's members (predominantly publishers and event managers) and the evolving industry, he was involved in the establishment of agreed publication circulation and event attendance audit standards. Alden held previous roles at global marketing companies Grass Roots and CPM; whose clients included Diageo, Oxfam, Which? Magazine and BA Concorde In-Flight Retail.

Previous to his career Alden gained a BSc (hons) in Environmental Science & Conversation, minoring in Coastal Management from York University, here he concreted his interest in earth sciences and the vital awareness of sustainable matters which continues to this day. Having implemented the “green team” whilst at ABC and now at AEV evolving the agenda and promoting the great collaborative work of the Cross Association Sustainability working group via the soon-to-be-launched event organiser, venue and supplier sustainability commitments.

Chris Hugall is the Managing Director of the Sustainable Energy Council. Starting his career in media at Haymarket, and then moving from media to the events industry. Having worked in Energy events he has seen the good bad and ugly side of the world. Now focussing on Sustainable Energy in particular Renewable Energy with a particular interest in Hydrogen. While helping the Oil and Gas industry continue its Energy Transition to a cleaner future. I look forward to helping the Events industry move towards a more sustainable future.

Chris is the Chief Executive Officer of the AEO (Association of Event Organisers), the leading association for organisers of events in the UK and internationally. He holds a seat on the Government’s Events Industry Board Committee and is Vice Chair & Treasurer of BVEP (Business Visits & Events’ Partnership), a partnership of all leading associations in the event industry, representing the sector to government and regulators. He is an UFI Board Member and chair of their associations and has the following to say about the importance of sustainability:

I had the pleasure of sitting on the British Standards BS8901 committee before it became the international standard ISO20121, which has helped businesses and events tackle their sustainable journey.

Sustainability is vital for our personal and professional futures. We all have a part to play and the events industry is no exception; influencing the supply chain, reducing and recycling waste, minimising our carbon footprint, keeping it simple where we can and taking faster steps to tackle this emergency.

Co Founder and Director of A Greener Festival (AGF), organiser of the Green Events & Innovations Conference (GEI), and Chair of the Green Working Group for the Association for Electronic Music (AFEM).

Co-founder of AGF since 2006, which set the standard for green events and has since certified hundreds globally for “A Greener Festival Award” from Glastonbury to Roskilde Festival, created the Green Artist Rider with Paradigm Agency, delivers sustainable events training globally, consults with major music and events organisations for their sustainability strategy and actions, has a network of AGF Assessors based in over 25 countries, and in 2020 launched A Greener Activation for brands, and “A Greener Arena Award”.

Claire organises the Green Events and Innovations Conference (GEI), established in 2008, which has become the key European gathering for the live industry dedicated to sustainability, in partnership with the International Live Music Conference (ILMC) each year in London.

As part of Arcadia Spectacular, Claire works as Show Producer and Aerial Performer at Glastonbury Festival and on international Spider Stage tours. Additionally, Claire is a Director of the not for profit arm “Arcadia Reach CIC”.

Formerly General Manager of the Association of Independent Festivals, New Media and Licensing Manager at Media Records, and varied live event management roles spanning 15 years; plus flying off the London Olympic Stadium roof dressed as a Mary Poppins in the 2012 Olympic Opening Ceremony, to defeat Voldemort with a brolly.

Emma Cartmell is an experienced entrepreneur and event organiser. Her company, CHS Group specialises in organising events for the meetings and events industry, include trade shows in Leeds and Birmingham, meet the buyer programmes around the UK and an industry awards programme.

CHS Leeds, their flagship event contributes over £550k to the Leeds economy each year and this year the CHS Group launched CHS Birmingham, an exhibition dedicated to the globally influential events community across the ‘Midlands belt’.

Under Emma’s leadership, the CHS Group have carved out a modern way of doing business, combining transparent business, ethical responsibilities, and a culture of ‘customer understanding and enthusiasm’. This has included the creation of a passionate team, over servicing customer needs, and client retention rates of well over 83%, almost double the national average.

Emma is also a passionate advocate for ethical business, including its responsibilities to the global environment. With this in mind, she recently invested in a corporate gifting company, specializing in recycled cork products, promoting the material as an eco-friendly alternative to animal and other organics.

She also runs a student volunteer programme each year, delivers guest lectures at universities throughout Yorkshire, speaks at industry conferences and exhibitions and is a regular contributor to industry magazines. She is a board member of the AEO (the Association of Event Organisers) and an ambassador for Clean the World. She lives in York and has a passion for travel, Cuban salsa, yoga, cooking and long walks, especially by the beach.

As WWF’s Engagement and Event Executive it’s my role to ensure that all of the events delivered within the organisation adhere to an exceptional environmental standard whilst creating amazing memories and experiences for our supporters and partners - without compromising the health of the planet. It’s important to me to make eco-conscious choices when planning events to ensure we create a demand for this within the industry and the interests of our future generations are considered. If we take care of our planet, then our planet will take care of us too.

Kai Hattendorf is Managing Director / CEO of UFI, the Global Association of the Exhibition Industry. As such, he is responsible for UFI activities and events globally, as well as the operation of its offices and presences in Paris, Brussels, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Dubai, and Bogota. Currently, Kai also serves as Honorary President of the Joint Meetings Industry Council (JMIC), the global council of international and global associations serving the Business Events Industry.

Prior to his current role, Kai worked in the exhibition industry for numerous years in senior management positions at Messe Frankfurt’s global headquarters, focusing on transformational issues ranging from digitisation to marketing and communications.

His previous career also includes leadership positions in marketing/strategic communications as well as in strategy and product development in the ITC and Media Industry for the Deutsche Telekom Group, the dpa Group (the German Press Agency), and a start-up.

A journalist by education, Kai has internationally reported and worked for the WDR and Radio Bremen broadcasters in Germany, at Euronews in France, the BBC in the UK, and the Voice of America. He holds a Master’s degree from the American University, Washington, DC. He also studied in Dortmund and Edinburgh.

Kat is the Venue Manager at BMA House – home of the British Medical Association. Having started a career in events in 2008 at De Vere Venues, Kat moved over to the BMA in 2015 as Sales Manager and in 2019 took up the role as Venue Manager. In 2017 BMA House achieved a Gold accreditation with Green Tourism, at the time only five venues in London had this and certainly not easy for a Grade II listed building BMA House has been awarded ‘Greenest Venue’ at the Hire Space awards in 2018 and the first venue to win the award two years in a row in 2019 too. At the London Venue Awards in 2019 BMA House picked up ‘Best CSR Initiative’ Silver award.

Kat was heavily involved in hosting their first fully sustainable awards ceremony in 2018, (the Global Good Awards), featuring an all-vegan menu with Carbon Balanced delegate travel. The Global Good Awards returned in 2019 and have booked again for 2020 & 2021. As a current mentee due to graduate in May 2020 on the FastForward15 programme founded and run by Fay Sharpe of BCD M&E, inspiring and empowering women in the events industry to be the best they can be, to help women aim for top level positions in the industry, Kat is leading the way in both sustainability for BMA House and a future leading woman in the events industry. Kat has a strong passion for collaboration within the industry and keen to help others build their sustainable credentials but also help others in their events careers.

Lauren is the Environmental Manager at WWF-UK, responsible for ensuring that WWF “walks the talk” by reducing its environmental impacts from areas such as water, waste, energy, procurement and travel, monitoring organisational carbon emissions, and maintaining their ISO 14001 certification. Lauren is an endless font of knowledge for all things sustainability and not only helps ensure WWF is the most sustainable organisation possible, but also encourages staff to lead more planet-positive lives too.

Meegan is an event sustainability professional focussing her efforts on using the power of events for positive action while also ensuring that events themselves are produced sustainably.

Her boutique consultancy Green Shoot Pacific provides advice, tools, systems support, training and practical solutions to the events and sport sectors.

Credits include Sustainability Manager for Festival Republic (Glastonbury, Reading, Latitude Festivals, UK), Live Earth Greening Guidelines, project consultant for the UNEP Music & Environment Initiative, sustainability strategy for Qatar 2022 FIFA World Cup, and external assessment of ISO 20121 for Gold Coast Commonwealth Games. She was recently Sustainability Programme Manager for Volvo Ocean Race 17/18 and with their award winning Clean Seas programme.

The third edition of her book Sustainable Event Management: A Practical Guide was published in Dec 2017 by Taylor & Francis and is an adopted text for many university degrees in event management.

In 2018 Meegan authored the guide to avoiding single-use plastics at sporting events. She has also contributed the sustainability chapters to books Routledge Handbook of Festivals and Festival and Special Event Management.

She was a sector expert in the global working groups developing the GRI Event Organizer's Sector Supplement and ISO 20121. She is founder and chair of the Sustainable Event Alliance and has trained more than 1000 event organisers in sustainable event management through 40 local governments.

Rachel has six years’ experience in marketing, having worked across a range of sectors, including sport, travel and real estate having previously held roles at CSM Sport & Entertainment and iLUKA. A future industry leader, her strengths include generating solutions to our clients most pressing business and brand objectives.

Her appointment as Junior Account Director in 2017 formed part of GPJ’s ongoing goal of elevating the sector by bringing together experts from a range of backgrounds, outside experiential. In her current role as a Client Partner, she leads one of our fastest growing and most exciting accounts – Google. Working tirelessly to energise multi-discipline teams and produce outstanding work.

Rachel continues to build her reputation as a future industry leader by heading up the GPJ sustainability taskforce who’s ambition it is to build sustainability into everything we do and create.

Raquel Noboa has worked in the Hospitality Industry for over 20 years and now as a Green Hospitality Consultant and trainer for the past 3 years. Raquel has an Ecotourism Diploma from the University of Washington, but her approach to greening and sustainability is a very different way than what other Green programmes might offer. Her training is based on simple actions that will help measure, monitor and reduce the use of Energy, Water and Waste in a business. Raquel believes in small wins, and going at your own pace, because Greening should not make people jump through hoops, and piles of paperwork, it is about knowing the environmentally sound options that are available, and applying those actions that make sense to each business. Starting small, get the big wins, and then look at possible investment projects to become even greener.

Rick, 46, oversees the growth strategy of Smyle Group which owns leading creative agency Smyle, that delivers live and video projects for some of the top global brands in a range of sectors including IT, Telco and Media. It has won the UK Event Agency of the Year award a record 5 times in last 11 years - in 2008, 2011, 2013, 2016 and 2018. Smyle has also been recognised as the fastest growing leading agency in the industry through its entry in The Sunday Times Virgin Atlantic Fast Track 100 in December 2018 and The Sunday Times HSBC International Track 200 in February 2019 & 2020. As a co-founder of The Global Sustainable Events Summit, its new format came from Rick’s belief in engaging with the full spectrum of the events and live communication industries, as well as building on Smyle’s ISO 20121 certification.

After years of managing global events in the higher education sector, I decided to take the plunge and create my own events management business. Eventism was incorporated in April 2019, combining two great and equal passions; creating and delivering experiences that inspire, educate and entertain whilst having a positive impact on the environment and society so our children and theirs are happy, healthy and able to enjoy this amazing planet. As with nearly everyone in our industry, events are in my DNA.

From kick-off meetings to those crazy days when it all comes together, I'm in my flow. I make no apology for saying that seeing the faces of people experiencing something amazing and memorable brings joy and makes me grateful for this opportunity. Over the past year I’ve delivered events in the UK, Georgia and Thailand all of which have been true to the kaizen principle of helping my clients do things a little more sustainably than they did before. Throughout this time, I’ve continually sought to deepen my knowledge on sustainable practices and theories and have developed my processes and principles around this knowledge.

Tim is the Founder and Production Director at SMART Power Ltd, an award winning live event power contractor. SMART Power specialises in delivering low impact power solutions and energy monitoring for live events and broadcast. His clients include Live Nation, Left Bank Pictures, Manchester Pride, Great Run Company, UCI Womens’ Tour of Scotland Cycling, King Power World Polo Championships and We Love Green Festival (Paris).

He is also Technical Director and Environmental Consultant at ZAP Concepts, where he works internationally to assist event organisers on providing sustainable solutions for power management, waste and recycling, water, travel and touring, biodiversity and resource management. His clients include Sony Pictures Europe, the BBC, Modern Sky (Asia), Boardmasters Festival and Brighton Pride.

Tim is the new Chair and Project Lead for Powerful Thinking, the event industry energy steering group . He has contributed content for all their published reports and is the author of the energy chapter in their new Show Must Go Report 2020. He also sits on the sustainability working group for UK Live Music, is a member of the leadership team for international body The Sustainable Event Alliance and is an Assessor for A Greener Festival.

Tim is a regular guest speaker and panelist at industry conferences, including ADE and Eurosonic (Netherlands), The Event Production Show, Green Events and Innovations Conference, UK Music Live Conference, The Executive Hire Show, C&IT Forum, The AEO Conference, The AEV Forum, The AIF Conference, PLASA and The AFO Conference. He has further hosted a number of industry panels, including Event Production Forum East (Hungary), The Showmans Show (UK) and Event Tech Live (UK).

He is a regular contributer to industry publications, including Stand Out, C&IT and TPI magazines, and has provided content for a range of reports on biofuels, localised emissions associated with temporary event power and single use plastics.

Tim guest lectures at universities across the UK, including Britiish Institute for Modern Music, Manchester Metropolitan University, Back Stage Academy and Derby University.