Ukraine to Host Regional Summit of the World Economic Forum

KYIV, Ukraine, January 24, 2013 /PRNewswire/ --

Kyiv plans to host the regional Europe and Central Asia summit within the framework of the World Economic Forum (WEF). The summit will address the promotion of gradual economic growth. Such statement was made by the President of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych during his meeting with the Executive Chairman of the WEF, Klaus Schwab.

The summit will search for ways to increase competitiveness and a dynamic, flexible mechanism for challenge response, said President Yanukovych. WEF regional summits are the meetings of regional decision-makers, business leaders, and representatives of civil society. They come together to discuss specific issues of a given region, enabling advancement in regional development. East Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America, and Europe have held regional WEF meetings.

In the last two years Ukraine has increased efforts to attract international forums and conferences. Besides Europe's major sports event UEFA EURO 2012, co-hosted by Ukraine in June 2012, the country also organized the 64th World Newspaper Congress. Coupled with the 19th World Editors Forum, the congress took place in September 2012. Organized by the Executive Committee of the World Association of Newspapers and Publishers, the event attracted nearly 1,000 representatives of the world's leading media from more than 90 countries. In 2012, the agenda of the annual congress included discussions of digital challenges for media, profitability, the future of the industry as a whole and newspaper operations in particular.

Ukraine itself is home to a major international conference - Yalta European Strategy Annual Meeting. Since 2004, the event has brought together heads of states and governments including, among others, British politicians Tony Blair and Gordon Brown, Polish leaders Bronislaw Komorowski and Aleksander Kwasniewski, the 42nd President of the U.S. Bill Clinton, as well as current Israeli President, Nobel Prizewinner Shimon Peres and former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder.

Another local initiative of regional scale is the international investor conference IDCEE. In October 2012, the Ukrainian capital received the conference for the second time. The event focuses on internet technologies and innovations. A startup fair, held at the conference in 2012, featured 150 projects. Some 50 international speakers addressed more than 2,000 participants.