The International Mountain Summit tackled urgent issues

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The International Mountain Summit (IMS), took place this year from October 30 to November 7, and celebrated its partnerships with leading organisations that work to protect mountain regions.

The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the Alpine and Carpathian Convention and the UIAA  all supported the weeklong event in Brixen/Bressanone, Italy.

UNEP  organized the IMS congress day on "Sustainable Tourism in the Mountains". Other timely issues on the agenda included: Handling World Heritage Sites the right way, women and mountaineering, the right to risk and rescue from the world’s highest mountains.

Manaslu Camp 2, 6.250 m(image: Air Zermatt)

The latter was organised by the The EURAC Institute of Mountain Emergency Medicine. EURAC is the first research institute in the field of Mountain Emergency Medicine, and it was founded in 2009.

Leading scientists, alpinists and stakeholders attended the seminar on rescues to discuss the contrasting points of view: favouring a rapid response team based in Europe, or the idea of initiating education and technical support to empower local alpinists and mountain rescuers.

President of the UIAA Medical Commission, Buddha Basnyat, was one of the keynote speakers, making an address titled, "Approaching a new chain of survival in the Himalayas".