Roskilde Wins MIDEM Green Award

Denmark’s Roskilde Festival is one of three major outdoor events to win a MIDEM "Green World Award," an honour set up to recognise trailblazers in ecological live event production.

Roskilde GM Henrik Rasmussen, along with Live Earth founder Kevin Wall and Daniel Rossellat from Switzerland’s Paleo Nyon Festival, representing the other two events to be awarded the new gong, will receive the honours at a special awards ceremony during this year’s MIDEM.

The ceremony will be followed by a panel discussion, "A Greener Live, Raising the Bar," which will feature other prominent figures from the live music industry.

"Live Earth, Roskilde and Paléo have been exemplary in their commitment to raising environmental concerns and they have redefined industry benchmarks for future event production," says Paul Zilk, Reed MIDEM’s chief exec.

Roskilde is the largest northern European music festival, exceeding the population of the fifth-largest Danish city and producing the equivalent in waste.

Some of its environmental policies date back to 1994, making the group one of the pioneers of the greener festival.

All beverages are served in plastic mugs with 97 percent of the mugs being returned to recycling deposit points.

The waste is sorted into 13 different categories and all organic materials are composted and used to re-fertilise the site. All profits from the festival are then donated directly to humanitarian causes.