BIR World Recycling Convention forced to go fully online due to pandemic, offering virtual networking opportunities
Today, BIR announces that its World Recycling Convention scheduled to take place on 12 and 13 October 2020 in Brussels cannot be held face to face because of current COVID-19 regulations affecting Brussels as event venue and because numerous countries implement strict quarantine measures and travel restrictions during the pandemic, which prevent BIR members to travel safely to the meeting.
BIR leadership has come to the conclusion that BIR members must not be exposed to potential health risks when maintaining a physical event. Instead, BIR will be offering a virtual World Recycling Convention, starting on 12 and 13 October with cross-commodity sessions of overarching interest to the recycling community and, on the days immediately after, followed by commodity webinars, which will be accompanied by networking sessions that will allow participants to connect and do business with each other.
“We are extremely saddened that the current circumstances do not allow us to offer our members the long-awaited World Recycling Convention which we had so carefully prepared”, says BIR President Tom Bird. “We were hoping that at the beginning of September the overall travel restrictions and health regulations would enable us to go ahead with the planned physical event. A safe and successful BIR Convention for all concerned – this was our first priority. Due to the still unforeseeable circumstances, this objective is unfortunately no longer feasible. We will make sure that the virtual meetings and trading sessions allow our members to give them the best framework conditions for their successful business dealings. You can expect the same quality content and innovative networking opportunities as during our physical event.”
The BIR secretariat will be circulating more detailed information on the event format, convention programme and conditions for participation in the coming weeks.
Source: Bureau of International Recycling aisbl (Brussels, 10. September 2020)
