Action planning for sustainability reporting

When adopting the 2030 Agenda, the member states of the United Nations (UN) committed to working closely with local and regional governments to implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Since 2015, cities, regions and their associations have been increasingly committed to tackling global social and environmental challenges in order to localise the SDGs on the ground.

On a voluntary basis, more and more municipalities are reporting on the implementation status in Voluntary Local Reviews (VLR) or Voluntary Sub-National Reviews (VSR) at regional level. These supplement the national reports (VNR) of the governments and are presented each year at the UN High Level Political Forum (HLPF).

From 2 to 4 December 2024, 37 practitioners from 25 institutions and 15 countries met at the German Association of Cities in Berlin to share their experiences in reporting. For the first time, representatives of municipal associations met with their colleagues from city administrations at a Connective Cites dialogue event.

In addition to exchanging experiences on good practices and different approaches to reporting, the aim was also to harmonise VLRs and VSRs with each other and, in a further step, to use the reports to accelerate the implementation of the SDGs at local and regional level.