John Davis
August 30, 2011
The formal name will take a while to evolve, but the IVU International Council has just made an historic decision about our major event.
The International Vegetarian Union began at a Congress in 1908, in Dresden, Germany, and for about the next 50 years held an International Vegetarian Congress' which settled into a routine of every three years, apart from the war years as these were nearly all in Europe. The photo above is that first Congress, all 22 of them, in 1908.
1908 Dresden, Germany- 1909 Manchester, England
- 1910 Brussels, Belgium
- 1913 The Hague, The Netherlands
- 1923 Stockholm, Sweden
- 1926 London, England
- 1929 Steinschonau, Czechoslovakia
- 1932 Berlin/Hamburg, Germany
- 1935 Daugaard, Denmark
- 1938 Hurdals Verk, Norway
- 1947 Stonehouse, England
- 1950 Oosterbeck, The Netherlands
- 1953 Sigtuna, Sweden
- 1955 Paris, France
- 1957 Delhi/Bombay/Madras, India
- 1960 Hannover/Hamburg, Germany
The Congresses began to spread beyond Europe - so the name changed to World Vegetarian Congress'and increased to every two years for about the next 50 years. The Congress visited more parts of the world, right up to the centenary, back in Dresden in 2008.
- 1963 Barcelona, Spain
- 1965 Swanwick, England
- 1967 Delhi/Bombay/Madras, India
- 1969 Jerusalem, Israel
- 1971 The Hague, The Netherlands
- 1973 Ronneby Brunn, Sweden
- 1975 Maine, USA
- 1977 Delhi / Bombay / Calcutta / Madras, India
- 1979 Loughborough, England
- 1982 Neu-Ulm, Germany
- 1984 Baltimore, USA
- 1986 Dubrovnik, Yugoslavia
- 1990 Tel Aviv, Israel
- 1993 Madras, India
- 1994 The Hague, The Netherlands
- 1996 Johnstown, PA, USA
- 1999 Chiang Mai, Thailand
- 2000 Toronto, Canada
- 2002 Edinburgh, Scotland
- 2004 Florianopolis, Brazil
- 2006 Goa, India
- 2008 Dresden, Germany - right: it was a lot bigger back in Dresden 100 years later...
... and the food at all Congresses has been completely vegan since the mid 1990s so that everyone can eat together in total harmony.
In 2010 we held what was still called the 39th Congress in Jakarta, Indonesia, except it wasn't a traditional congress as the formal representative/delegate meetings had been moved online over the previous two years.
In reality Jakarta was much more like a Vegfest - with a huge food fair as well as lots of high quality speakers, entertainment, and all kinds of other things going on - with about 5,000 people visiting the food fair, and hundreds attending the lectures.
Some of the crowds in a small corner of the Jakarta 2010 all-vegan Food Fair
So... the IVU Council has now taken the major decision to move ahead into the next 50 years - there will now be an event every year - and the name will change again. It will combine aspects of Congresses, such as just gathering everyone together (there are always informal meetings going on) and lots of great speakers - and aspects of Vegfests, like the food fairs and entertainment. A lot of these things overlap anyway and there is often not much difference between events called conference, congress, expo, festival or just fest.
The annual event will rotate around the six IVU regions: -Africa, Asia-Pacific, Europe, India and SW Asia, Latin America and North America. So each region will host this major event every six years instead of the previous twelve years.
... and before anyone says 'that's twice as much to organize', there were actually nine international veg events in 2010 alone, eight of them run by more than this anyway.
We want to move away from the idea of encouraging people from all around the world to meet in one place - instead the annual event will move around and now you won't have to wait so long before there's one near you.
The primary focus will be on bringing together people in neighbouring countries, and reaching out to the local community. But of course everyone will be welcome to all of them, and it is always great to meet people from the other side of the world - everyone will just have to balance their own conscience about the carbon emissions of long haul flights.
Beyond 2012 it could be different depending on the events... More about IVU at: www.ivu.org
