Mayors' Conferences
27th Mayors Conference - Gothenburg and online 2022
The 27th Mayors' Conference and 8th World Forum took place in Gothenburg and online 13-14th June 2022.
The World Forum and Mayor’s Conference is a meeting place for people from all continents who are working to prevent drug abuse, ensure evidence-based and gender-sensitive practices, increase access to treatment, and to promote recovery and reintegration services. This global forum is one of its kind where NGOs, self-help groups, treatment centres, scholars, local, regional, and national authorities, politicians and other decision-makers, and others from around the world will meet to share evidence and best practice experiences. This year’s World Forum will include three main tracks: Prevention, Treatment/Recovery, and Advocacy, which will stretch over 1,5 days followed by the WFAD Congress and ECAD Mayors plenary session.
We are proud to announce that the Forum was inaugurated by UNODC Executive Director Ghada Waly and will be joined by experts from around the world.
Read more on the website: https://2022.wfad.se/ and access the full report here.
26th Mayors Conference - Cork 2019
25th MAYORS´ CONFERENCE
and 6th World Forum Against Drugs
Conference materials
Kevin Sabet, PhD, Director, Drug Policy Institute, University of Florida, President, Smart Approaches to Marijuana (SAM), USA
Speech at the WFAD /ECAD 25th Mayors Conference, Gothenburg, May 15, 2018 (Video 5min.)
Supply reduction in Peril? A lot of the worlds`s drug supply emanates from a war-torn Columbia.
Dr. Michael Jonsson, FOI, Swedish Defence Research Agency
Text to the slides (PDF)
In Columbia, a peace deal has been struck, which gives hope for a closure of insurgency and violence. (PDF)
Thomas Pietschmann, Dr, Drug Research Section, Division for Policy Analysis and Public Affairs
The International drug control system, global/regional and national drug patterns and trends, and supply reduction efforts at the international level (PDF)
Photo: Götaplatsen @ Klas Eriksson
Annual Mayors` Conference and the 6th World Forum Against Drugs will take off on May 14-15 in Gothenburg this year.
This joint event will address a growing interest to the effective prevention practices, full recovery and alternatives to incarceration and to life-long dependency on drug treatment.
The conference will create a room for elaborating a practical guide to how a recovery city will look like, this will be grounded on the recent evidence-based research. Sheffield Hallam University (UK), Ghent University (Belgium) and the City of Gothenburg have already started working on this guide in practice.
In order to find out more and to register please visit a joint webpage here.
MAYORS` CONFERENCE 2017


ECAD 24th Mayors` Conference materials
On June 12-13, the city of Kaunas hosted ECAD 24th Annual Mayors`s Conference 2017
Safe Cities Without Drugs. Preventing, Protecting, Policing
Key-note speakers:
David W. Spencer, Field intelligence Manager, Drug Enforcement Agency, European Region
Supply reduction and dismantling drug trafficking organizations: In what ways can local communities benefit (PDF)
Kim Nilvall, Swedish National Bureau of Investigation, Intelligence section, Organized crime
Police work in socially disadvantaged areas in Sweden: Impact of drugs on urban crime (PDF)
Torsten Stodiek, Deputy Head, Strategic Police Matters Unit, Community Policing Advisor, Transnational Threats Department, OSCE
Preventing terrorism and countering violent extremism and radicalisation that lead to terrorism:
A community and intelligence led policing approach (PDF)
Jon Sigfusson, Director for Icelandic Centre of Social Research and Analysis, Reykjavik University, ICSRA
Youth in Europe and Planet Youth (PDF)
Laimonas Vasiliauskas, Senior Specialist, Serious and Organized Crime Department, EUROPOL
European Illicit Drug Market (PDF)
Antonio Boscini, Health Director, San Patrignano Community, Rimini, Italy
Recovery and social reinsertion: San Patrignano Community model extended (PDF)

CONFERENCE PROGRAMME (PDF)
FIRST ANNOUNCEMENT (PDF)
Conference Booking Form

Kaunas Castle
Picture: @Rokas Tenys
Warm welcome to Kaunas, Lithuania!
- Details
- Category: The ECAD Mayors' Conference

This year ECAD and WFAD will be hosting the joint hybrid forum in Gothenburg, Sweden and online between 13-14th of June 2022.
The World Forum and Mayor’s Conference is a meeting place for people from all continents who are working to prevent drug abuse, ensure evidence-based and gender-sensitive practices, increase access to treatment and to promote recovery and reintegration services. This global forum is one of its kind where NGOs, self-help groups, treatment centres, scholars, local, regional, and national authorities, politicians and other decision-makers, and others from around the world will meet to share evidence and best practice experiences.
This year’s World Forum will include three main tracks: Prevention, Treatment/Recovery, and Advocacy, which will stretch over 1,5 days followed by the WFAD Congress and ECAD Mayors plenary session.
We are proud to announce that the Forum will be inaugurated by UNODC Executive Director Ghada Waly and will be joined by experts from around the world.
More information: https://2022.wfad.se/ and via this link.
- Details
- Category: The ECAD Mayors' Conference
1. Time spent in meaningful activity is of tremendous importance.
2. No one should walk the recovery path alone
Other than that the conference focused on exploring different pathways and viewpoints towards recovery from drug addiction. Many valuable insights were provided by international as well as national irish experts on addiciton and recovery. Stakeholders, people with experience and care givers provided comprehensive perspectives on the subject.
A brief overview of some of the presentations could be made following the link down below:
https://www.irista.com/gallery/idv4foujhfo0
Pictures from the conference can be accessed here:
https://www.irista.com/gallery/hbex0akjhe0x
- Details
- Category: The ECAD Mayors' Conference
The conference will be focusing on different aspects of recovery from drug addiction and what cities can do to promote a sustainable recovery from addiction.

- Details
- Category: The ECAD Mayors' Conference
On June 12-13, 2017 the City of Kaunas will host the 24th ECAD Annual Mayors’ Conference “Safe Cities Without Drugs. Preventing, Protecting, Policing”.

It is our pleasure to invite you to this important conference and to share successful examples of prevention, discuss common problems and find common solutions. Safe cities without drugs are the cities preventing effectively, policing crime, protecting the citizens and their health.
UPDATE: CONFERENCE PROGRAMME IS NOW AVAILABLE FOR DOWNLOAD (PDF)

Download FIRST ANNOUNCEMENT (PDF)
CONFERENCE BOOKING FORM (to be sent to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.)

Picture: Kazys Mikalauskas
Warm welcome to Kaunas, Lithuania!