By Edgar Gillet
The AIVP World Conference is a yearly event bringing together players from across the maritime and shipping sectors, port authorities and port-city leaders. It took place this year in Dunkirk (France) from 3 to 6 November 2026 and offered a chance to exchange good practices and share experience from the field, all this against the backdrop of the North Sea’s sandy dunes, in the cold light of November morrows. This year’s theme, “Cities and Ports in Motion: Time for Action!”, focused on the changes reshaping port cities today and over the coming decades, and on what these changes mean for the relationship between ports and their surrounding communities.
As the author of these lines happens to work at AIVP and look after MAGPIE’s communications, it seemed only natural for our project to be represented there. Throughout its lifetime, MAGPIE has namely kept a close eye on its impact and worked to strengthen, even activate, the relationship between ports and cities.
And in Dunkirk, MAGPIE certainly made its presence felt. The project was represented by Reyer Will of the Port of Rotterdam, who presented the project’s work and legacy at the focus session “Delivering the Energy Transition in Port Cities: from Masterplan to Implementation”, where he shared the stage with Stéphane d’Audiffret of CMA CGM and Frédéric Busin of EDF. The presentation allowed Reyer to showcase MAGPIE’s legacy: the Green Innovation Compass. A QR code displayed behind him invited the audience to explore the platform and discover how its different solutions can be combined and applied across port contexts.
The “Green Ports” MAGPIE exhibition was there
too. After its appearance at the Ports in Transition conference in Rotterdam and
six months on display at Le Havre Port Center, it moved to Dunkirk for six
days. There, participants had the opportunity to explore the exhibition and
interact with its content, offering another chance to share the project’s work
and show how exhibition tools can help bring ports closer to the public.
Finally, MAGPIE also featured in AIVP’s conference brochure, distributed to participants ahead of and during the event. The publication brings together the organisation’s achievements, and MAGPIE occupies a prominent place among them. The same author of these lines wrote it ; I am particularly proud of the introduction. You may read the complete contribution below.
