Carpathian Day
Celebrate the Carpathians through Carpathian Day on or around 26 September! This is a yearly celebration of our diverse and common identities, landscapes, heritage and love for the Carpathian region.
The Carpathian region holds a wealth of traditions, cultural sites, biodiversity, and unique habitats and species. Carpathian Day aims to create annual momentum for highlighting these great cultural and natural landscapes and foster a sense of pride and belonging across the region. Celebrating Carpathian Day helps cultivate a Carpathian identity, raise environmental and cultural awareness of mountain landscapes, and inspire further protection and sustainable development of local communities.
Join us in hosting your own Carpathian Day projects, events, roundtables, exhibitions and festivals to strengthen relationships, environmental and cultural awareness, promote intercultural exchanges and embrace diversity.
Are you planning on hosting a Carpathian Day event? Share your planned activities with us!
Whether you are an NGO, a public administration, a corporate entity or a citizen who loves the Carpathians, you can be part of the celebration.
Carpathian Day 2026
CARPATHIAN PASTORALISM: WHERE NATURE AND CULTURE MEET
Pastoralism has shaped the Carpathian region’s physical and cultural landscape for thousands of years. It has helped maintain biodiverse mountain meadows and healthy soil and water, while also fostering shared local culture and traditions.
Pastoralism is both a livestock management system and a way of life. Herders move animals like sheep and cattle between pastures, often following seasonal routes. Along the way, they produce food, crafts, medicines, and other goods, keeping traditional knowledge alive.
In many Carpathian communities, pastoralism still plays an important role. It provides livelihoods, supports families, and brings people together through festivals, music, and local products that also attract tourists.
However, pastoral traditions are under pressure from climate change and social and economic changes in rural areas. Protecting these practices is key to sustaining both nature and local cultural heritage in the Carpathians.
In recognition of its importance worldwide, the United Nations has named 2026 the International Year of Rangelands and Pastoralists. Carpathian Day 2026 builds on this momentum, celebrating and raising awareness of pastoral traditions and practices in the Carpathians.
ACTIVITY IDEAS
We have put together some educational materials to help you celebrate and inspire your communities. We encourage you to organize an event that best suits your institution and community. Whatever you organize, be sure to register it on our website!
Pastoralism Factsheet & Activities
This factsheet includes quick facts about the importance of pastoralism to people, nature and culture in the Carpathians; challenges that Carpathian pastoralism faces; practical ways to support pastoralism; and simple activity ideas for incorporating pastoralism topics into your Carpathian Day event (or any event!).
Visuals for Carpathians Lesson Plan
This lesson plan encourages participants to recognize their local Carpathian natural feature(s), create a connection or relationship with the area or the story, and identify visual and conceptual inputs (symbols, colors, values) associated with it. It is differentiated for various target groups. We encourage you to share your results with the Secretariat of the Carpathian Convention to help formulate the creative foundation for Carpathian Day branding.
In addition to the ideas in the materials above, simple activities such as the following can also be easily implemented:
- Explore a nearby pastoral landscape through walks, observation, maps, photographs, sounds, stories or conversations.
- Observe signs of grazing, haymaking, livestock movement, biodiversity and seasonal change.
- Meet pastoralists, rangers, local residents or other people who know the landscape and learn from their experience.
- Collect stories, place names, memories, observations and local knowledge connected to pastoral life.
- Create maps, drawings, photographs, short texts, audio stories or other creative interpretations of what they discover.
- Discuss the challenges facing pastoralism and imagine possible ways to support pastoral communities and landscapes.
- Share what you discover with the community.
Participate in Carpathian Day
Everyone has a part to play in Carpathian Day!
#CarpathianDay26 #CarpathianDay
Share your love of the Carpathians on 26 September with the world using the hashtags #CarpathianDay26 and #CarpathianDay. If you are participating in a Carpathian Day event, take a picture and highlight the experience! Follow along with other Carpathian Day celebrations as well, and tag @CarpathianConvention on Facebook.
Whether you are an NGO, a public administration, a corporate entity or a citizen who loves the Carpathians, consider hosting an event or organize activities to promote our diverse and common identities, landscapes and heritage. Be sure to share your event with us for further promotion!
Need ideas or inspiration?
- Read the descriptions from the registered events in the map above
- Consider implementing the Visuals for Carpathians lesson plan
- Consider implementing various activities listed in the Pastoralism Factsheet & Activities document
Don’t know where to start with organizing a Carpathian Day event? Partner with local contacts. A nearby landscape, a simple map, a notebook and one local conversation are often enough to begin. Contact a protected area administration, ranger team, UNESCO site, municipality, school, museum, community group or local producer. One nearby person, one place and one good question are enough to begin.
Check out registered Carpathian Day events throughout the region from previous years in the posts below.
Carpathian Day and the Carpathian Convention
Romania has been celebrating Carpathian Mountains Day on 26 September for several years. The Carpathian Convention then explored the possibility of expanding this celebration beyond Romania to the whole Carpathian region.
The Conference of the Parties to the Carpathian Convention welcomed “the idea of establishing the Carpathian Day to further promote the protection and sustainable development of the Carpathians and the Carpathian Convention activities at various levels,” and invites the Parties, relevant stakeholders and the Secretariat to contribute (Decision COP7/1).
The Carpathian Education for Sustainable Development Expert Network is the main entity coordinating the organization and promotion of Carpathian Day (Decision COP7/19) with support from the Carpathian Convention Secretariat, the Carpathian Network of Protected Areas (CNPA) and the Science for the Carpathians Network (S4C).
Vienna Programme Office
Secretariat of the Carpathian Convention
UN Environmnent
Vienna International Centre
PO Box 500
A – 1400 Vienna
Tel: +43 1 260 60 83038
Mail: info.carpathianconvention@un.org
Large Carnivores
Education for Sustainable Development
© Secretariat of the Carpathian Convention
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