By Li Shouen, CCTV.com Reporter
On June 6 - 8, the Film Cities Summit of UNESCO Creative Cities Network (UCCN) was hosted by the Qingdao Municipal Government, which runs parallel to the Asia Media Summit that is also hosted in Qingdao.
More than 100 participants from China Film Association, five Film Cities, including Bradford of Britain, Rome of Italy, Sydney of Australia, Santos of Brazil and Bitola of Macedonia, China's national Creative Cities Beijing and Shanghai, China Film Group Corporation, CCTV Movie Channel, Wanda Group, 1905 (Beijing) Network Technology Co., Ltd. and Qingdao West Coast Development Group Co., Ltd. were in attendance.
Sun Lijie, Member of the Standing Committee and Head of Publicity Department of the CPC Qingdao Municipal Committee and Zhu Peiji, Vice Mayor of Qingdao were there as well.
On June 6, the Forum on Film and the Sustainable Development of Cities was held as part of the summit. Delegates delivered speeches focusing on the development of global film industry, development status and trends of the Chinese film industry, the outlook of Qingdao's film and creative industry, etc.
Delegates from film cities and the applicant city Qingdao jointly released the Qingdao Declaration of Film Cities in 1907 Movie Club.
The following initiatives were put forward to materialize aims set by the Creative Cities Network and to promote the sustainable development of cities:
-To fulfill the aims of UNESCO Creative Cities Network;
-To develop and expand the Creative Cities Network;
-To strengthen cultural exchange and cooperation among creative cities;
-To enhance exchange between film and other creative fields;
-To establish sustainable mechanism for cooperation.
Established in 2004, UCCN is designed to make creativity a driving force for sustainable development of cities. It covers seven types of creative cities, namely, the Design City, Film City, City of Crafts and Folk Art, Gastronomy City, City of Literature, City of Media Arts, and Music City.
After more than a decade's development, 116 cities from 54 countries have become members of the Creative Cities Network. Eight Chinese cities have joined the Network so far: Shenzhen, Shanghai, and Beijing are in the catalogue of Design City; Hangzhou, Suzhou, and Jingdezhen are City of Crafts and Folk Art; Chengdu and Shunde are branded as Gastronomy City.
There are 8 cities, which have been approved by UNESCO as the Film City: Bradford, UK, Sydney, Australia, Busan, South Korea, Galway, Ireland, Sofia, Bulgaria, Bitola, Macedonia, Rome, Italy, and Santos, Brazil.
In view of its natural environment, history, talents and film industry, the CPC Qingdao Municipal Committee and Qingdao Municipal Government put forward the idea of applying to become a Film City in 2015.
In accordance with UNESCO's arrangement, the application for creative cities will be closed on June 16. The appraisal and selection process will start from August and results will be announced on October 31.
(The opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect the opinions of Panview or CCTV.com)
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