Day 3 at Resilient Cities 2014: “Go home and transform the world”

01 June 2014

 

On the last day of Resilient Cities 2014, the air was still filled with enthusiasm, desire to learn and share and eagerness to act!

 

The morning plenary “Financing the Resilient City: Progress toward bottom-up finance approaches” was one of the most anticipated sessions of the conference. The good news is, financing resilience is finally taking off. However, there seems to be a matchmaking gap and a silo problem. Different stakeholders aren’t communicating effectively and the divide between public and private is still overly demarcated. Nevertheless, the fact that financial institutions, private investors and reinsurers have begun to realize the necessity of resilience and adaptation funding is encouraging and confirms that the global community has – in the past years – come a long way. 

 

The G2 workshop on “Local integrated climate action from an urban planning perspective” looked deeper into the ‘controversial relationship’ between adaptation and mitigation.  While both approaches encompass a process of positive changes, they can also impede the benefits of one another. The session presented ways to build on the synergy between the two by offering successful examples from Rotterdam (the Netherlands), Copenhagen (Denmark) and Almada (Portugal).  

 

It was however the final outlook plenary that sent people off full of optimism and readiness to apply the extraordinary number of lessons learnt. In the coming two years there is a convergence of decisions in many of the most important workflows of global cooperation.  As ICLEI Deputy Secretary General and ICLEI South Asia Executive Director Emani Kumar made more than clear: Since a COP-21 agreement in Paris will not come into effect until 2020, the real responsibility of doing the necessary work until then will fall upon cities and local governments.”

 

This was echoed by Jeb Brugmann, Managing Partner, The Next Practice and Founder of ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability who specifically addressed the mayors present at Resilient Cities 2014 when saying “Don’t run for presidency- you have more influence running your cities!

 

ICLEI and expert organizations, according to ICLEI’s President David Cadman, will need to mobilize the grassroots, to nourish the courage and determination required of our elected leaders to act.

 

The outlook plenary was also the stage of the announcement of the 1st Resilient Cities to be happening in Asia, organized by ICLEI – Local Governments for Sustainability in Bangkok, Thailand, on 11-13 February 2015. Mrs. Sermsook Noppun, from ICLEI Member Bangkok Metropolitan Administration and Mr. Emani Kumar invited all participants to mark the date and join them in Asia next year. 

 

 “Go home and transform the world” – were David Cadman’s inspiring  words that concluded a yet another successful Resilient Cities confererence . 

  

For a full overview of day 3 highlights, click here.

For more blog posts, videos and pictures, check the Resilient Cities blog

 

 

 

 

Day 3 at Resilient Cities 2014: “Go home and transform the world”
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