17.000 participants online and in-person from 155 countries. That’s how many people and countries were reached by the World Urban Forum. Connective Cities spent four very insightful days in Katowice/Poland, where besides hosting a panel discussion on the importance of peer-to-peer consultation for local change initiatives, we also met with urban practitioners from around the world to exchange on current challenges and to elaborate further partnerships and cooperation.

The panel discussion, moderated by Sabine Drees from the Association of German Cities, highlighted the importance of exchange between municipalities. One of the main outcomes of the exchange between Bonn and Manizales, the Columbian municipality decided to implement various activities that brought the SDGs closer to the citizens. Such as the SDG week - a great success, which will be organised this year in September as well, as Maria Camila Sanint announced. Stefan Wagner from the city of Bonn, Germany, stated that for him its crucial to see how other municipalities engage in challenges - beyond the existing twinning. For him, Connective Cities opens the horizon by providing a broad variety of international cities that work on the same issue. Peer-to-peer consultation gives additional value to applicable solutions and many take-aways on how to adjust and improve to local challenges.

In addition, Lvivvodokanal, Stadtwerke Lviv/ Ukraine, and its German partner enterprise, Stadtentwässerungsbetriebe Köln, outlined the benefits of working together to improve water and wastewater supply. Volodymyr Bilynskyy, Deputy Chief Engineer at Lvivvodokanal, emphasised the importance of constant water supply despite the ongoing war – many cities and towns are cut off from their water supply due to the Russian occupation, reparations are therefore not possible. Thanks to the immediate support of the three German partner companies, Stadtentwässerung Dresden, Berliner Wasserbetriebe and Stadtentwässerungsbetriebe Köln, diesel generators were delivered to Lviv. The city was able to run the water pump station again and supply their firefighters and citizens with water. This is a good example of the importance of partnerships and its support in times of emergency, Volodymyr Bilynskyy explained. Matthias Brune from the partner utility in Cologne added: „We were quite surprised when our Ukrainian partners wanted to continue with our online meetings even after the war started, but now we are glad to support them and continue our joint work.“ The partnership is part of the pilot project ‘Utility platform for strengthening partnerships of municipal utilities worldwide’. An initiative to strengthen municipal partnership cooperation between businesses from Germany and the Global South (more here).

New challenges demand new solutions. Connective Cities presented its new programme based on agile formats, which was introduced during the pandemic. It aimed to help communities to react quickly to urban challenges - be it during the pandemic, climate crisis or in conflict and war. Important elements are high demand orientation, collective search for pragmatic solutions and an approach which enables cities to become innovative and creative, explained Muna Shalan from Connective Cities office in Amman/ Jordan. Many partners are joining hands in this programme, as for example the Wuppertal Institute with its city lab approach. We look forward to welcoming many cities to this new programme! For those who missed the panel: you can watch the recording here (Minute 4:50:52).

Beyond the panel discussion, however, many new contacts and also friendships were made.

 
Together with Yuri Bova, Mayor of Trostyanets/ Ukraine, we discussed how the reconstruction of Ukrainian cities can look like. After weeks of fighting, Russian troops were successfully driven out of Trostyanets - what remains is a destroyed city. To start rebuilding, the town urgently needs a functioning transport network and construction infrastructure. First, however, the town must be cleaned up - there is a lack of excavators, sweepers, buses and much more. The municipality then wants to work on an investment strategy to revive local industry and tourism, which requires help and support from friends and partners.

Further, the two twin cities Bonn/ Germany and Ramallah/ capital of the Palestinian National Authority in the West Bank were discussing how to increase impact and evolve strategies within twin city relations. The twin cities Bonn and Ramallah intend to work on urban development projects against the background of climate change - for example counteracting the city's heat island with the help of unsealed surfaces. With the support of Connective Cities, we are planning to organize an Urban Forum for twinning cities – aiming to develop joint projects and making the best out of partnerships. More information will follow soon!

How will we organize energy supply by tomorrow? This question was discussed by municipal representatives from Libya and Connective Cities. We envisage a cooperation regarding the sustainable urban development in Libya around a broad range of topics such as energy partnerships, waste management, green urban development, governance, and economic development.

Another major theme of the World Urban Forum was the central role of cities in disaster management, be it pandemics, climate disasters or conflicts. They are often responsible for rescuing people, organizing food and medical help and for saving lives. Jointly with the Global Initiative on Disaster Risk Management, Connective Cities supports municipalities to prepare better for all sorts of crisis situations. UNDP Disaster Risk Reduction Bureau acknowledges the critical importance of cities in this field and now wants to collaborate with us on developing and disseminate pragmatic peer learning approaches to increase resilience of cities. We are looking forward to this new and important cooperation.

The 11^th World Urban Forum has once again shown how important it is to have direct contact with peers worldwide. Only by working together can we strengthen the transformative force of cities!

Impressions

Photo credits: All Photos: Connective Cities