ICM Postpones 2025 Regional Conferences 

The International Confederation of Midwives has decided to postpone our 2025 Regional Conferences, which had been planned for the Western Pacific and South-East Asia regions in Cambodia, and for the Americas region in Jamaica.  

Rest assured, our 2026 Triennial Congress in Lisbon, Portugal will go ahead as planned.

Over the past few weeks, the non-profit sector, especially for organisations working in fields including gender equality and women’s rights has changed rapidly. As we evaluate the impact of these shifts on our organisation and our member associations, we have made the difficult decision to postpone the planned Regional Conferences. While strengthening our regions remains a key priority, hosting Regional Conferences is a significant financial commitment, and in an increasingly uncertain global landscape, we cannot take our current financial stability for granted. Taking a proactive approach now will help ensure that we can continue to support midwives and midwifery in the long term.

Next Steps

As the venue announcement and registration had still not opened at the time of our decision, this decision does not have any financial consequences for our members and midwives. However, we know how disappointed our members in the Western Pacific, South-East Asia and Americas regions will be at this news. We commit to finding ways to support our midwives’ associations and provide the affected regions with other ways of connecting, sharing and strengthening their regional collaboration.

While we are unable to make any firm commitments at this time, we are looking at the possibility of hosting regional conferences in the affected regions in the 2027-29 conference cycle. In the meantime, we encourage all midwives, member associations, and partners to plan on attending and register for the 2026 Triennial Congress in Lisbon, Portugal, which will go ahead as planned. This Congress will be a key moment for the global midwifery community to come together, and we are committed to ensuring that, while keeping the focus global, we continue to engage midwives’ associations in meaningful regional work.