Author: erik

A Mayors Dialogue on Growth and Solidarity: reimagining human mobility in Africa and Europe

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Cities are at the forefront of human mobility, reducing carbon emissions and fostering social cohesion within diverse urban communities. The world is looking to city leaders to provide ideas and solutions that can be adequately resourced and that work on the ground.

Cities participating in the Mayors Dialogue on Growth and Solidarity highlighted several current and future policy priorities, with two overarching goals.

  • First, encouraging inclusive and sustainable urban growth, both in the more immediate recovery from Covid-19 and in the longer term.
  • Second, enabling social inclusion and access to services for all residents regardless of status, with a particular focus on vulnerable populations.

Inter-city cooperation takes different forms, such as long-term bilateral partnerships and city-level networks. The Dialogue will act as a broker for international partnerships, helping pairs and clusters of cities test innovative approaches to finding solutions for pressing urban challenges and catalyse new ideas, elevating mayors and cities as regional and global leaders.

Transport for under two degrees – the way forward

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The transport sector is the fastest growing source of greenhouse gas emissions at present. It accounts for approximately one quarter of global greenhouse gas emissions and hence figures prominently in efforts to transform the energy economy and protect the climate. Without a scaled-up global mitigation effort, it will not be possible to reach the climate targets of the Paris Agreement. A low-carbon transformation of the global transport sector is the next necessary step in the global energy transformation.

Germany’s Federal Foreign Office has commissioned the project “T4<2° – Transport for under two degrees”, a global foresight study on the decarbonisation and transformation of the transport sector to identify challenges and opportunities for a sustainable, low-carbon transport sector. The findings provide decision-makers with a clear vision and specific recommendations on how to achieve decarbonisation of the sector and orchestrate international efforts for a global transport system transformation.

Call for participants: The role of innovation in curbing the impacts of the pandemic

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The crisis inflicted by the Covid-19 pandemic has triggered many initiatives around the world to employ innovative solutions that aim at impeding the spread of the virus and curbing its disastrous impacts.
Examples of these impactful innovations include shift labs, remote screening and monitoring of patients, DIY face shields, low-cost ventilators, and the mobilisation of 3-D printing and robotics to manufacture vital medical devices or test kits. Overall, the registered progress at this front has highlighted the underlying and more critical long-term need to better resource and institutionalize strategic innovation in rebuilding local capacities of the health and economic sectors. Some expert opinions advocate for greater investments in developing platforms for diagnostics, vaccines, and therapeutics as a means to overcome the huge economic toll of this pandemic. Similarly, supporting and funding highly innovative start-ups, scale-ups and SMEs is crucial to the economy’s fast recovery.

Given the urgency for innovative solutions to the pandemic, sharing existing and emerging breakthrough achievements is of utter importance. Sharing and disseminating such knowledge can potentially facilitate the creation of partnerships which in turn are pivotal to initiating strategic and operational response to the short-term challenges resulting from COVID-19, as well as to the long-term planning for recovery.

To this end, this virtual knowledge-exchange event showcases ongoing grassroot initiatives developed collaboratively by local and national entities, research institutions and the private sector. In particular, FIGHTCORONA.AC initiative1 from Aachen (Germany), COV-Fight project2 from Biskra (Algeria), as well as the good practice of using 3D-printing technology for the production of medical supplies3 in Batnah (Algeria) will be presented.

Language: English and Arabic.

Date: 14th October 2020
Time: 13:00 – 14:45 CEST

More Informationen: Programme [pdf]

If you have any queries about the event and the participation process, we encourage you to contact

Muna Shalan, Connective Cities’ regional coordinator for MENA: muna.shalan@giz.de

Call for participants: Prevent infections through distance, communication and support of the informal sector

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Prevenir las infecciones mediante la distancia, la comunicación y el apoyo del sector informal

Intercambio virtual de experiencias sobre la pandemia de COVID-19 en América Latina el 14 de octubre y el 5 de noviembre de 2020

Para la versión en español, ver abajo.

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Shortly after the COVID-19 outbreak in Europe, the virus also hit Latin America hard. The current challenges in combating the pandemic require a combined solution strategy consisting of medical care, regulatory infection control measures and short-term economic bridging measures – and all this with the help of appropriate and convincing communication. How can cities and municipalities make a contribution here?

Even though many Latin American countries imposed strict measures, including curfews in accordance with the above-mentioned distance rule, at a very early stage, the pandemic could not be contained – the number of infections continues to rise in many countries.

In Latin America, other important factors come into play: a decisive factor is the high proportion of workers in the informal (urban) sector, who have to commute from densely populated urban fringe areas to the city centre to perform their daily work. The home office option does not exist for the informal sector, and the renunciation of the daily wage is not sustainable. As a result, distance rules cannot in fact be observed for a large part of the population working in the informal sector.

In addition to economic support, it is essential to follow chains of infection. Without precise observation of those infected and the tracing of infection chains, distance rules will not lead to success. Communication and the strengthening of public awareness is also an important factor here.

Connective Cities offers cities and municipalities the opportunity to exchange their experiences and success strategies and to discuss challenges together. In the process, approaches to solutions from German cities and cities in the Latin American region will be presented. If you would like to present a practical example from your city or discuss a specific challenge, we invite you to participate in our event.

After the virtual session the participants can continue their exchange on the virtual platform of Connective Cities in special virtual working groups. A virtual follow-up event (on 05.11.2020) offers the opportunity to deepen the solutions developed and to further develop possible project ideas.

Date: 14 October 2020 (part 1) and 05 November 2020 (part 2)
Time: 16:00 – 18:30 CEST / CET
Language: Spanish / Portuguese

Registration deadline: 09 October 2020

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Poco después del brote de COVID-19 en Europa, el virus también golpeó duramente a América Latina. Los desafíos actuales en la lucha contra la pandemia requieren una estrategia de solución combinada que consista en atención médica, medidas reguladoras de control de la infección y medidas económicas de transición a corto plazo, y todo ello con la ayuda de una comunicación adecuada y convincente. ¿Cómo pueden las ciudades y los municipios contribuir a ello?

Aunque muchos países latinoamericanos impusieron medidas estrictas, incluidos toques de queda de conformidad con la regla de la distancia mencionada anteriormente, en una etapa muy temprana no se pudo contener la pandemia – el número de infecciones sigue aumentando en muchos países.

En América Latina entran en juego otros factores importantes: un factor decisivo es la elevada proporción de trabajadores del sector informal (urbano), que tienen que desplazarse desde las zonas periféricas urbanas densamente pobladas hasta el centro de la ciudad para realizar su trabajo diario. La opción de la oficina en el hogar no existe para el sector informal, y la renuncia al salario diario no es sostenible. Como consecuencia de ello, las normas sobre la distancia no pueden observarse de hecho para una gran parte de la población que trabaja en el sector informal.

Además del apoyo económico, es esencial seguir las cadenas de infección. Sin una observación precisa de los infectados y el seguimiento de las cadenas de infección, las reglas de la distancia no conducirán al éxito. La comunicación y el fortalecimiento de la conciencia pública es también un factor importante en este sentido.

Connective Cities ofrece a las ciudades y municipios la oportunidad de intercambiar sus experiencias y estrategias de éxito y de debatir juntos los desafíos. En el proceso se presentarán enfoques de soluciones de las ciudades alemanas y de las ciudades de la región de América Latina. Si desea presentar un ejemplo práctico de su ciudad o debatir un desafío específico, le invitamos a participar en nuestro evento.

Después de la sesión virtual los participantes pueden continuar su intercambio en la plataforma virtual de Connective Cities en grupos de trabajo virtuales especiales. Un evento virtual de seguimiento (el 05.11.2020) ofrece la oportunidad de profundizar en las soluciones desarrolladas y seguir desarrollando posibles ideas de proyectos.

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Further information / Más información: Konzeptpapier (DE), Papel de conceito (PT), Documento conceptual (ES)

If you are interested or have any questions, please contact us / Si está interesado o tiene alguna pregunta, por favor contáctenos:

Paulina Koschmieder, paulina.koschmieder@giz.de

Municipal responses in the COVID-19 crisis: Experiences with contact tracing and outbreak management

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On the 28th of September, Connective Cities held its third virtual Covid-19 Response dialogue. The event focused on “Experiences with contact tracing and outbreak management” and brought together good practices from Berlin, Germany and Hazmieh, Lebanon. Common challenges and cooperation opportunities were identified by the participants in the implementation of municipal measures to contain the pandemic.

The former head of the health department Charlottenburg-Wilmersdorf of Berlin gave the first input by presenting tasks and responsibilities of the public health sector in Germany, and how it relates to the municipal response to Covid-19 pandemic.
The second input was given by AccuMapping, a Lebanese technology firm that presented tools for strategic preparedness and planning using GIS in the case of the city of Hazmieh. AccuMapping’s method is explained in this video. 

The two presentations were followed by a session of questions and answers with the practitioners. 

The Connective Cities Team would like to thank all the participants for the interesting exchange of experiences. Please check the Connective Cities website for reference material and more events in the COVID-19 Response Series.   

Call for participants: Covid-19: Economic impact and recovery

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The Covid-19 pandemic has had a deteriorating impact on the national and local government economic resources. In economies that largely depend on informal labour market, a lot of people have lost their livelihoods. The governments have been torn between life and livelihoods as the interaction of people propels the spread of the virus.

This shift affected the revenue stream for the local government especially in the cities as a result of shrinking businesses and also a mass migration of the urban population to the rural areas. This has a negative impact on effective operations of the municipalities and service provision.

Whilst the impact of this pandemic has been felt worldwide, cities have responded with different measures to avert the spread and cushion against long-term impacts and even future pandemics. It’s against this background that Connective Cities1 is offering a platform in which cities will share the challenges they have experienced and interventions that have either been implemented or are being planned to safeguard against the negative impacts and future pandemics.

In the second series  at10th & 12th November, 2020, 13:00- 15:00 (CET), we look at the economic impact of the pandemic, recovery and resilience of cities.

Conference language is English.

More information:Concept paper [pdf 3 pages]

Participation and contact

If you have further questions or would like to participate, please send an e-mail to Sophia Kamau (sophia.kamau@giz.de), Regional Coordinator for Connective Cities in Sub-Saharan Africa.

Call for participants: Provision of municipal services during a pandemic

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Covid-19 pandemic has caused a lot of negative impacts to many cities and municipalities across the world. According to UN Habitat, about 44% of the total African population live in urban areas of which 47% live in slums and informal settlements characterized by poor access to potable water and safe sanitation, overcrowding and often deficiency in service provision. The inadequate capacity of many Sub-Saharan countries to provide adequate water infrastructure despite being a major necessity in the fight against the covid-19 pandemic has made it difficult to contain the virus spread within many cities. This makes cities more susceptible in the ongoing spread of the pandemic in the region and the enforcement of the WHO guidelines on prevention and fight against the pandemic a challenge. Sub-Saharan Africa’s rapid and unplanned urbanization is therefore seen as a huge risk factor of Covid-19.

The impact of this pandemic has been felt worldwide yet cities have responded with different measures to avert the spread and cushion against long-term impacts and even future pandemics. It’s against this background that Connective Cities1 is offering a platform in which cities will share the challenges they have experienced and interventions that have either been implemented or are being planned to safeguard against the negative impacts and future pandemics.

In the first series, we look at the provision of municipal services and specifically water supply and solid waste management services.

Conference language is English.

More information:Concept paper [pdf 3 pages]

Participation and contact

If you have further questions or would like to participate, please send an e-mail to Sophia Kamau (sophia.kamau@giz.de), Regional Coordinator for Connective Cities in Sub-Saharan Africa

Phasing out plastics

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Plastics today feature in every part of our lives and are found everywhere. The global realisation that plastics are an environmental problem has focused on plastic waste and pollution, but plastics are also problematic in terms of the global climate emergency, because almost all plastics today are made from fossil fuels. 

Building on recent literature about plastics and climate change, this report explores the potential for extensive emission reductions in the plastics sector. Using a scenario approach, we present an assessment of the technical feasibility of phasing out the production of new fossil plastics by 2050, based on detailed analysis of the potential to transform the use of plastics in four sectors – automotive, construction, packaging and electrical and electronic equipment (EEE).

Call for participants: Experiences with contact tracing and outbreak management

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This event is part of our series International exchange of experiences: lessons learned in the Covid-19 crisis , and brings German municipal experts together with international actors to discuss how municipal administration can act to improve the response to the current crisis. Among other issues, this dialog will discuss good practices of contact tracing and outbreak management. Practice examples will be presented by experts from Germany and abroad. The overall aim of the event is to achieve a joint exchange of experiences and to develop ideas for cooperation.

Date: 28th September 2020
Time: 13:00 – 15:30 (CEST)

Please find more information in our Call for participants (pdf).

If you have any queries about the event and the participation process, we encourage you to contact:

Alexander Wagner 
alexander.wagner@engagement-global.de
Telefon +49 (0)228-20717-455

Thiago Garcia
thiago.garcia@engagement-global.de
Telefon +49 (0)228-20717-633

South-East European Local Governments in Post Covid-19 Socio-Economic Recovery

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South-East European (SEE) local governments (LGs) have been and will certainly remain at the forefront in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic social and economic crisis. In serving and protecting their communities they have been facing unprecedented challenges in multiple dimensions. SEE local governments have been responding to these challenges with a strong spirit of solidarity, putting their citizens lives before everything else and working tirelessly to provide support to the most vulnerable.

The crisis required local governments to take timely measures to shut down selected local services, quickly switch to remote working practices and digitalise administrative services, expand programs for securing citizens healthcare, expand social protection and care for a significantly higher number of vulnerable people, take measures to allow the smooth implementation of online or long-distance learning, etc. In the aftermath of the control or minimisation of the first wave of infection SEE local governments have taken specific ad hoc measures to support the survival of their local communities and economies.

The purpose of this survey is to help improving the understanding over the impact of the COVID-19 crisis at the local government level in South-East Europe, identifying effective and innovative social and economic recovery strategies and ultimately helping formulating concrete policy proposals to inform advocacy efforts of NALAS member Local Government Associations.