Conama Local Background

CONAMA (National Environmental Congress) is the key professional sustainability event held in Spain. It is has been held in Madrid every two years during the last week in November in even-numbered years since 1992. Each edition of Conama generates a large network of individuals and institutions involved and engaged with a move towards sustainable development based on the premise that we are all important in this process. In 2010, during its tenth edition, CONAMA attracted over 10,000 attendees; 2,108 people actively participated for months before it was held in preparing activities and 578 institutions cooperated at different levels. Extensive information on Conama 10 is available at: www.conama10.es.

Since the first editions of CONAMA, local issues have been widely discussed at the congresses, meriting specific sections since 1998 when a thematic unit named "Sustainable Cities" was created and promoted, among others, by the City Council of Vitoria- Gasteiz and the Governing Council of Barcelona. In 2006 this unit was consolidated as a forum within the conference under the name of "Local Meeting" and, after the 2008 edition, the decision was made to convene annually, alternating the edition held within the framework of Conama on even-numbered years, with editions held outside Madrid on odd-numbered years.

In 2009 the 3rd Local Meeting took place in Seville (with over 600 attendees). The "Spain 2020/50 Global Change. City Programme" report was presented there with the idea of raising medium and long-term goals and scenarios for the actual sustainability of cities.

In 2010, the fourth edition was held at Conama10 (with 1,272 attendees) with the motto that it is necessary to promote sustainability "now more than ever".