The RISING Global Peace Forum, now in its fourth year, brings leading politicians, policymakers, academics and community organisers from around the world to Coventry, the UK’s only International City of Peace and Reconciliation, to discuss and promote new ways to make and sustain peace, both in local communities and on an international level.
This year’s event, ‘RISING 2019: The Ecosystem of Peace’, will be held at various venues in the city centre between Wednesday, November 13 and Friday, November 15.
The theme of this year’s Forum acknowledges that building and sustaining peaceful relations at all levels is a complex and interconnected business that is vital to our economic prosperity and the thriving communities in which we live.
Amongst the keynote speakers already confirmed are a former Commonwealth Prime Minister and the Chief Executive of one of the world’s largest international charities working to help children change their lives.
The RISING 2019 programme will also include the award of the Coventry Peace Prize and the annual Lord Mayor’s Peace Lecture.
This year the Forum has also decided for the first time to offer a proportion of delegate spaces free of charge to 6th form students at local schools so that they can be inspired about the importance of building peaceful communities as they decide what to do when they leave school.
Richard Dickson, RISING Development Manager, said: “The idea for RISING came from a Coventry and Warwickshire Champions event and it is now established as an internationally-recognised event.
“RISING is organised through a partnership between Coventry City Council, Coventry Cathedral and Coventry University, represented by the Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations.
“Coventry is a city with a long history of looking outwards and doing business innovatively with people around the world, and for many centuries has been prepared to have peaceful dialogue and trade with people from other cultures.
“The local business community helped get RISING off the ground in 2015 and, whilst the City Council, Cathedral and University each contribute financially towards some of the costs, we wouldn’t be able to put the event on without the generous sponsorship and donations of local businesses.”
Peter Deeley, Managing Director of the city-based Deeley Group, has supported RISING since its inception.
He said: “This is an idea which was spawned from a meeting of business people and Coventry University, Coventry City Council and Coventry Cathedral have developed an event which is growing in status and attracting global speakers.
“RISING is a unique and valuable opportunity to learn how successful interventions have been made in some of the longstanding and troubling issues round the world and to see how those are being promoted and supported by Coventry.
“It can only be good for the reputation of the city regionally, nationally and internationally and helping the Coventry and Warwickshire’s business community have a positive image can only be good for business as a whole.”
For more information about sponsorship opportunities, email [email protected] or visit www.rising.org
