BANFF — Due to the Covid-19 pandemic, the Banff World Media Festival was officially cancelled by organizers on Monday.
In an emailed statement, the Banff Festival said it had made the difficult decision to cancel the 2020 edition of the festival, originally scheduled for June 14-17, 2020, following public direction given by the World Health Organization, the Canadian government and the Alberta government.
Festival organizers say they are working closely with all of their sponsors, partners, vendors and speakers who have been supportive. All currently registered delegates have the option to transfer their 2020 registration to next year’s festival (expected to take place in June 2021) or receive a full refund.
“Cancelling the festival after 41 years of success was not a decision that we took lightly, but it was the right thing to do for festival delegates, speakers, and staff,” said Randy Lennox, president of Bell Media and chair of the Banff Festival board of directors, in the statement. “I commend the Banff team and our board for making this tough but necessary call, and I’m confident that the festival will come back better than ever in 2021. Please stay safe everyone.”
Many conferences scheduled for the spring have been shifting dates to the fall, which is getting pretty full at this point in time.
“Although we had kept hope up in recent weeks, it became clear that it would be impossible to hold the festival with no certainty regarding what the safety situation might be by June in addition to restrictions on large gatherings and travel bans in place at most media companies,” said Jenn Kuzmyk, executive director, Banff World Media Festival. “We are not able to gather in person this year, but our team is already working on new ways to connect, inform, inspire and serve our industry. We look forward to working with all of you in the coming months to do just that.”
While the festival is cancelled, the 2020 Rockie Awards International Program Competition will continue to take place. The international jury of industry professionals is currently judging entries and the Banff Festival will present the 2020 Rockies to winners this year.
In addition, the Banff Festival will also continue to deliver fellowships and initiatives, such as the Banff Spark Accelerator for Women in the Business of Media. Banff organizers say they will be reaching out to the inaugural cohort of 50 participants with details about their plans, and are set to announce the second cohort of participants soon.
Furthermore, Banff will provide the third edition of the Netflix-Banff Diversity of Voices Initiative, a program designed to jumpstart and accelerate the careers of up to 100 Indigenous, Francophone and women producers and creators. This year’s participants will be announced in the coming weeks.
Finally, the Banff Festival organizers are still accepting applications from scripted drama short-form series producers and creators for the IPF Producer Bursaries until Thursday, April 9. And the Corus Writer’s Apprentice Program recently closed and the 2020 participants will be announced soon.
For more information about the Banff World Media Festival, please click here.
