40 years and a new LGBTI world conference

ILGA (International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association) will be celebrating 40 years of history next year, immersed in a deep reflexion on the future challenges of LGBTI policies around the world, choosing the motto “Celebrating the past to liberate the future”.

ILGA’s next world conference will take place in Wellington and this will be the first time that it is held in Oceania. ILGA wants this to be a call for a greater participation of indigenous groups and for greater visibility for the actions and organizations in the Asia-Pacific region. The conference will be organized by organizations Intersex Trust Aotearoa New Zealand, Tīwhanawhana Trust and Rainbow Youth and will take place from 18 to 22 March 2019.

The process has started and there is a call for grants and proposals. ILGA offers grants to facilitate the participation of people who otherwise would not be able to participate. Activists from Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Caribbean and the Pacific Islands will have priority when accessing these grants, although there will also be a limited number of grants for activists coming from Europe, North America, Australia and Aotearoa – New Zealand.

As for the contents of the conference, activists and LGBTI organizations can start submitting their proposals and ideas for workshops and specific work sessions in different formats. ILGA has defined some of the themes it considers key for the future such as education, health, required legal reforms, religion, culture, sports and a more internal matter like fundraising.

Requests for grants and the submission of content proposals will be open until 18 August.

The organization has been organizing world conferences since 1978, and they are the strategic element for ILGA, to project and share, and where representatives are elected and new member organizations are given access. For ILGA, these world conferences show the state of the play for LGBTI issues at a global level and also bring to light the shortcomings in priority action areas. During all these years, conferences have been held around the world, and Barcelona hosted two of these, in 1980 and in 1993.