EUROPE - European pension funds only have one week left to submit their nominations for the tenth Annual IPE European Pension Fund Awards, taking place in Monaco on 7 December.

Submissions are welcomed for categories such as best pension fund by country, with individual categories for Austria through to the UK, and other countries such as Cyprus able to enter for the smaller countries award.

IPE will honour the top industry-wide and corporate pension funds, as well as the best in-house investment team.

It will also reward those who have dealt with risk management issues and portfolio construction in the most creative and innovative ways.

Submissions should be submitted by next Friday, 24 September, via the Awards website.

Previous winners include Danish pension fund ATP, which last year won the most awards, as well as the UK Environment Agency pension fund and PensPlan in Italy.

ATP's Bjarne Graven Larsen, speaking of their sweeping success in 2009, which saw them claim seven prizes, said winning gave the fund an internal standard to judge themselves by.

"ATP has used the IPE Awards as a way to benchmark the fund's progress," he added.

Piers Diacre, publisher of Investment & Pensions Europe, said: "After 10 years, IPE believes winning an IPE Award has become the benchmark for pension funds in Europe.

"We are committed to ensuring our annual 'search for excellence', which we consider the IPE Awards to be, continues to be an inspiration for pension funds for the next 10 years."