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Predseda organizačného výboru EUGEO 2009 a riaditeľ Geografického ústavu SAV doc. Vladimír Ira počas otvorenia kongresu.

Challenges for the European Geography in the 21st Century

17. 8. 2009 | 3426 visits
EUGEO 2009, the second Congress on the Geography of Europe attracted geographers and related professionals from around Europe.

The EUGEO meeting forum stimulated the discussion about research, education, accomplishments, and developments in geography. EUGEO is the Society of the scholarly Geographical Societies, Associations of Geographers and other membership organisations representing geographers and geographical sciences in the member countries of the European Union. The first EUGEO Congress was organized by the Royal Dutch Geographical Society (KNAG) in 2007 in Amsterdam.

The EUGEO Congress 2009 was held on August 13-16, 2009 in Bratislava, Slovakia. It has been organised by the EUGEO, the Slovak Geographical Society, Faculty of Natural Sciences of the Comenius University in Bratislava, and the Institute of Geography, Slovak Academy of Sciences. The membership in the Honorary Committee was accepted by the Rector of the Comenius University in Bratislava František Gahér, President of the Slovak Academy of Sciences Jaromír Pastorek, President of the Slovak Geographical Society René Matlovič, Chairman of the Self-Governing Region of Bratislava Vladimír Bajan, President of the EUGEO Christian Vandermotten, President of the Czech Geographical Society Tadeusz Siwek and President of the Polish Geographical Society Jerzy Bański.

The venue of the EUGEO Congress 2009 was the Comenius University in Bratislava, Faculty of Natural Sciences. It was attended by more than 120 participants from 24 countries. Besides the Slovak geographers, the greatest representation had the EU countries, mainly Italy, the Czech Republic, Hungary, Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, Latvia and the United Kingdom. Participants from Japan, USA, Russia and Turkey attended the Congress, too.

Plenary lectures were presented by Tadeusz Stryjakiewicz (Poland), Armando Montanari (Italy), Jozef Minár (Slovakia), Christian Vandermotten (Belgium), Jiří Blažek (Czech Republic), and Zoltán Kovács (Hungary). The Congress programme was divided into six blocks of 25 sessions with a total of more than hundred pronounced or poster presentations. Among them, the greatest attention was devoted to such themes as Political Geography and Geography of Governance, Global Mobility, Land Use and Land Cover Change, Urban renewal, Regional disparities and Tourism Geography.

Text: Vladimír Ira, Institute of Geography SAS
Foto: Ferdinand Tisovic