The Fellowships will begin with the Fellowship Colloquium (1–3 Sept) for Fellows and invited experts only, where the Fellows will be given a chance to exchange views among themselves, to discuss issues chosen by them with the invited experts, and to prepare for the visit of their European Colleagues during the subsequent (3–6 Sept.) Oxford Seminar with high-level government representatives from the participating European Partner countries as well as the European Commission.

The Fellowships Programme – typically for higher-level government officials/civil servants (‘decision makers’) who play a leading role in the UNFCCC process both domestically and internationally – lies at the heart of the ecbi.

Its primary purpose is to build trust and exchange procedural and institutional knowledge both among the Fellows (‘South-South trust-building’), and between them and their European colleagues (‘North-South trustbuilding’).

The venue for the Fellowships will this year be Christ Church College, founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII,
and alma mater of many famous pupils and dons such as the philosopher John Locke, and the mathematician
The Reverend Charles Lutwidge Dodgson, better known under his pen name ‘Lewis Carroll, who placed
Alice’s Wonderland in the College’s Fellows Garden.