Making the festival more sustainable is one of the organization’s most important missions. One tool in the work was to achieve the Sustainable Event certification via Greentime, which is now complete!

– We are very proud to have reached such an important goal, says Jane Johnzon, concept developer.

As one of Gothenburg’s biggest events, Gothenburg’s Kulturkalas influences both other organizers and the festival’s visitors, and taking responsibility for sustainable development has long been a matter of course for the organization behind it. Now this work is raised to another level with the help of a certification as a Sustainable Event.

– We want to create a festival that is as responsible as it is fun and inspiring. Being certified is proof that we are on the right track, says Jane Johnzon, concept developer at Göteborg & Co.

Extra large investments in the area of ​​sustainability for this year’s festival are that the entire area around the StreetFoodFestival will be completely disposable, and that the children’s and family area at Slottsskogsvallen will be accessible for people with different functional variations.

The Sustainable Event certification is issued by the company Greentime, which hires independent auditors to review the sustainability work. To be approved, the event must meet a large number of requirements in the areas of organization, environment and social sustainability. It is, for example, about equality, accessibility, diversity, safety and security, waste, chemicals, transport and energy.

– Working with sustainability and sustainable development within large events can be quite complex and extensive, but the certification process has helped us to structure and quality-assure the work, says Jane Johnzon, concept developer at Gothenburg’s Kulturkalas. We are very proud that we have reached such an important goal along the way in our sustainability journey.

The certification is still preliminary. The final one is obtained after the event when the responsible auditor has carried out checks at the festival to see that the event lives up to what the organizer promised.

Read more about Greentime here.

Working actively with sustainability issues via certification is nothing new for Gothenburg’s Kulturkalas, but in previous years it has taken place via SUSA, Sustainable Standards, which is issued by the Swedish Environment Agency.

Read more about the festival’s sustainability work here.