The event aims to put culture high on the EU agenda and to voice the concerns and proposals of the cultural field. More than 150 cultural operators, artists, decision-makers and policy-makers from 35 countries will gather together to discuss and propose a European cultural strategy.

The goal of the three-day working conference is to agree on such a strategy and on new tools of cultural action in Europe. These should promote mobility, strengthen cooperation, encourage communication and debate and consolidate trans-national networks.

The idea is to have a cultural strategy that enables the cultural sector to use its creative forces for innovation in Europe more effectively – a strategy that stimulates participation (a bottom-up approach) and fits the needs of the cultural sector itself, and which is based on new (public-private) partnerships and on sufficient European resources.

In preparing the Sharing Cultures conference, the ECF issued a petition – signed by hundreds of representatives of cultural organisations – which calls on European policy-makers to demonstrate their commitment to European cultural cooperation and citizenship.

This petition will be handed to the ministers when the conference's policy recommendations are presented to them on 13 July.

Sharing Cultures takes place in the Cruise Terminal at Rotterdam from 11 to 13 July. Its opening session on the 11th will have contributions by ECF president HRH Princess Margriet, Rotterdam’s mayor Ivo Opstelten, ECF director Gottfried Wagner, Dutch State-Secretary for Culture Medy van der Laan and the European Commission’s Director-General of Education and Culture Nikolaus van der Pas.