In the days following the 2017 UIAA General Assembly, a dedicated workshop focusing on mountain access was held at the headquarters of the National Olympic Committee of Iran in Tehran.
The workshop titled ‘Educative Access’ united members of the Iran Mountaineering and Sport Climbing federation, national executives and security and rescue authorities. Access Commission President Juan Jesús Ibáñez Martín (FEDME) represented the UIAA and defined the objectives and plans for this new task group. Martín draw on the UIAA’s experiences in this field working with federations around the world and provided guidance on best practices and standards, focusing on the following points:
- Required standards to prepare maps of mountains and nature areas
- Environmental considerations in the mountain environment
- Fundamentals of safe and low risk summits
- Access Commission’s relationship with the International Skyrunning Federation. It’s position and the importance of interaction in terms of skyrunning competitions
- Investigating the essence of the creation of the universal mountaineering database
- Profiles of the most successful countries in terms of managing mountain access
Mehdi Soheil Farid, the responsible person for the Access section of the Iran Mountaineering and Sport Climbing federation, presented a report on the process of this section and its future plans. In the final section, attendees held a constructive discussion which comprised a Q&A section assessing the challenges of mountain access.
Workshops of this nature are a regular feature of the service the UIAA can offer its member federations.
Report in collaboration with Mehdi Soheil Faridb
