On 17 February, the Fair Festival Award was presented by the United Services Union (ver.di). This was the second time that IFFF Dortmund+Köln was honoured as a fair festival. The award ceremony took place during the Berlinale as part of the AG Kurzfilm short film reception. This is the third time the union has awarded the prize.

‘With the Fair Festival Award, we want to highlight fair conditions in the festival industry and publicise structural problems,’ says ver.di Federal Executive Board member Christoph Schmitz-Dethlefsen. ver.di conducted a survey among festival employees. It was clear that the participants were predominantly female and had a high level of education. ‘Nevertheless, they are rarely employed on a permanent or unlimited basis. In particular, pay, which is also a consequence of insufficient funding for the festivals, is only considered fair by 32 per cent of those surveyed. Almost 70 per cent of festival employees are without a permanent position and cannot live from their festival work all year round and many have to finance their livelihood through other jobs,’ says Schmitz-Dethlefsen.

The Hamburg Short Film Festival was honoured with the Fair Festival Award. In addition to the IFFF Dortmund+Cologne, other festivals also received the Fair Festival Award: abgedreht! – Hamburg’s Young Film, the Mannheim-Heidelberg International Film Festival, the Braunschweig International Film Festival and DOK.fest Munich.

For the assessment, all festival employees in Germany were asked to rate the festivals at which they worked. In two nationwide ver.di surveys, fairness was assessed in the following categories: Working conditions, employment contract, communication, leadership & working atmosphere, co-determination, equal opportunities & equal treatment, remuneration and transparency.

Press release by ver.di