BS NGO Forum 2009 was held in Helsingør (Elsinore) in Denmark from the 26th of February to the 1st of March 2009.  It assembled more than 120 representatives from 16 countries within the EU and the Baltic Sea states and adjacent areas. The participants came from diversified civil society organizations within the social, human rights, environmental, cultural and educational fields.

The NGO Forum was attended of representatives of the Danish government, the Council of the Baltic Sea States (CBSS), the Nordic Council of Ministers, the Nordic Council, the European Commission, The Baltic Sea Parliamentary Conference (BSPC), the European Parliament and Baltic Development Forum.

The participants were gathered to discuss social inclusion, civil dialogue, lifelong learning, cultural diversity, sustainable development, environment, human rights, culture, co-operation with media and fundraising for transnational co-operation.

The work of the Forum was organized in plenary sessions and five thematic workshops:  "Lifelong Learning", "Tolerance and Cultural Diversity", "Social Inclusion", "Environment & Climate change" and "Civil Dialogue".

The workshops composed recommendations to the plenary assembly – and the recommendations were compiled in the Final Declaration.

At the end of the Forum the big blue glass bowl was handed over to representatives from the Lithuanian delegation. The bowl is given to the focal point from the country to take over the presidency of the CBSS. In this way the bowl is a symbol of the obligation to organize the next NGO Forum.

Forum history and development

In 2001 – 8 years ago – the Danish-Russian Association under the chairmanship of Mr. Kjeld Aakjær took the initiative in starting cooperation between NGOs from the Baltic Sea Region and a conference in Copenhagen was arranged. The initiative was known as the “Copenhagen initiative”. Germany was inspired by the initiative and later that year arranged an NGO conference in Lübeck. The Baltic Sea (BS) NGO Forum was born. Since then an NGO conference has been arranged virtually every year in the chair country of the CBSS.