World Economic Forum World Economic Forum The World Economic Forum (WEF), based in Cologny-Geneva, Switzerland, was founded in 1971 as a not-for-profit organization. It gained formal status in January 2015 under the Swiss Host-State Act, confirming the role of the Forum as an International Institution for Public-Private Cooperation. The Forum's mission is cited as "committed to improving the state of the world by engaging business, political, academic, and other leaders of society to shape global, regional, and industry agendas." The WEF is best known for its annual meeting at the end of January in Davos, a mountain resort in Graubünden, in the eastern
International Economic Forum of the Americas of Montreal, the Toronto Global Forum, the World Strategic Forum and the Conference of Paris. The International Economic Forum of the Americas was founded in 1995, when Gil Remillard, a former Minister of Justice of Quebec, held an inaugural Conference of Montreal, on June 20–22, 1995. At the time, the globalization of the economies was beginning to emerge at an increased rate. With the fall of communism, the success of the "Uruguay round" in 1989, the creation of the World Trade Organization (WTO) in 1994 and the beginnings of North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), the world was ready to