/ Town Hall
Monday 12th February 2018
SMART ISLAND WORLD CONGRESS 2018 IS FOCUSED ON THE ALLIANCE BETWEEN ISLANDS TO DEFINE THEIR FUTURE
Sustainable tourism, digitalised and intelligent islands and natural resources will be the protagonists of the debates
The strengthening of relations between island territories to address issues such as climate change, economic competitiveness, technological innovation and tourism will be the main objective of the second edition of Smart Island World Congress (SIWC), the first world congress on smart islands. The event, organised by Fira de Barcelona, with the support of the Government of the Balearic Islands, the Consell de Mallorca and Calvià Town Hall, will be held on 23rd and 24th April in Calvià (Mallorca) and expects to gather a hundred representatives from islands around the world, 85 speakers and 25 exhibiting companies.
After a successful first edition focused on the needs and opportunities of island territories in a globalised world, the 2018 edition evolves and focuses on the need to seek synergies and strengthen the links and the network between them to adavance to the main challenges faced by the islands of the future. Thus, the second edition of Smart Island World Congress will be a meeting place where to build alliances and connections between the key players of the island ecosystem to strengthen themselves while facing the shared challenges.
The programme of the congress will pivot around three main thematic axes: the island's leadership in the tourism industry, the future challenges of the islands and the resources of the insular territories.
In the first, sessions on smart and sustainable tourism, technology applied to tourism, health, social welfare, cultural heritage or seasonality will be developed. The axis on the future of the islands will gather the opportunities offered by the islands to startups, business incubators, entrepreneurship, mobile connectivity or smart islands. For its part, climate resilience, environmental sustainability, desalination, architecture, waste management, renewable energy and infrastructure will be addressed in the axis on natural resources.
Over these three areas, 15 conferences will be structured (2 keynotes, 3 plenary sessions and 10 parallel sessions) involving 85 speakers, including island leaders, industrial experts, and heads of research centres, universities, governments and international organisations that will share experiences and solutions on the current state and future of the management of the islands around the world. The second edition of Smart Island World Congress will also have an exhibition space with around 25 companies and a networking area where island representatives, speakers, companies and visitors can develop professional contacts before and during the event. It is expected the attendance of about 2.000 congress members from a hundred islands around the world.
Smart cities, smart islands
SIWC, which has the support of the World Bank, UN-Habitat, Global Island Partnership and Dafni Network, is the leading event on smart islands in the world that offers in insular territories a debate space where to face in a shared way the future challenges in the field of technology, innovation and own resources. The congress takes advantage of the consolidated international experience of the Smart City Expo World Congress, organised by Fira de Barcelona since 2011 and consolidated as the world leader in the smart cities sector.
On 23rd and 24th April 2018
www.smartislandcongress.com
