Our Activities

ICLEI is providing a platform for inspiration, action and the commitment to take sustainability to the next level.

In nearly three decades of work, ICLEI has developed, tested and scaled up methodologies to guide the way towards sustainable urban development at the local level. This rich experience accumulated allows us to apply a common framework for our global projects and initiatives, which currently follows the stages: analysis, action and acceleration, and in each one follows a step-by-step guideline. This track can be applied to a variety of themes – from low emission to nature-based development – and promotes a cyclical path that allows the continuous improvement of the governments in our Network. This year’s “Cities + Sustainable – ICLEI South America Solutions Portfolio” highlights the following opportunities and initiatives ICLEI provides cities and regions in South America.

ICLEI is working with Google in order to solicit nonprofit project proposals – exact allocation of funds provided by Google.org would likely range from $100K to $500K per organization; evaluate and select projects to fund with Google input and potential input from local governments; work with the EIE team understand the potential use cases for the data; potentially play a role in monitoring outcomes, capturing insights, and surfacing those insights and examples to other cities; potentially provide capacity building support to selected nonprofits to help them effectively implement their projects. The selected organizations will use EIE to inform and action plan – This could mean more data-driven / tech organizations can help a city integrate new data sources into planning, develop analyses or projections, or model out effects of various actions; and implement actions that help them achieve a goal set using EIE – This may include
awareness building (i.e. getting a specific community out of cars and onto bicycles), volunteering to install solar panels.

ICLEI Innovation will select teams, startups, products, services and innovative processes in the segment of afforestation or urban green areas, which strengthen the management and sustainability of cities, promote green spaces, adopt solutions based on nature and generate measurable management results municipal public health. Through a public announcement inviting organizations for proposal submissiton, ICLEI will select 10 best proposals and start a mentoring process with the selected ones through the online traction e-learning platform and the growth path methodology. This project is expected to collect innovative and sustainable solutions to the challenges brought by local and regional governments.

The objective of the Forum is to create a regional platform of municipal governments, specifically through its Planning or Development Secretaries, to promote the exchange of knowledge, practices and models of sustainable development between Amazonian subnational governments and the subsequent dissemination of experiences at regional level. The network acts as a cooperation mechanism to position Amazonian cities as global references for sustainable urban development in a context of tropical forests, in which managers collaborate mutually in the implementation of monitoring measures and efforts to reach the SDGs. ICLEI is responsible for (i) the identification of potential cities for involvement with the network in the first year, (ii) the definition and implementation of connection and exchange mechanisms for the group, for permanent dialogue and mobilization with members, and for (iii) regional meetings to build an agenda for cooperation between local governments, the active exchange of experiences and the position of cities as drivers of sustainable urban development.

ICLEI is responsible for several activities: Disseminate, communicate and exploit project results; Standardisation activities; Establish and maintain a framework to enable co-creation between research partners and city partners; Develop ‘state-of-the-art’ report on mainstreaming gender in building cultural heritage resilience; Review, map and characterise good practices Europe-wide in regard to making historic areas more resilient. This will be achieved by working with the pilot cities Bratislava (Slovakia), Camerino (Italy), Hamburg (Germany), and Valencia (Spain) to develop tools and methodologies that will be combined into a collaborative disaster risk management platform for local authorities and practitioners, the urban population, and (inter)national expert communities. These efforts will ensure project results that are applicable and useful in practice, supporting informed decision-making by local government leaders and technical staff, with a view to better protecting cultural heritage assets from climate impacts and other disasters.

ICLEI was responsible on international policy processes. Through desk research, interviews and direct participation, ICLEI identified relevant political dynamics and processes regarding the rural-urban nexus in the context of HABITAT III (preparation and implementation) and the implementation of the SDGs. The aim is to identify ways through which the German federal government, and especially the Ministry for Environment and Building, can influence these processes in order to foster a global sustainable rural-urban nexus.
Part of the problem is that there is a limited understanding of the interconnections and hence development potential between urban and peri-urban areas due to an insufficient data base and lack of suitable indicators. That's why ICLEI collected fitting indicators out of a pool of (inter)national indicator sets and – in a second step – developed relevant indicators where needed. The indicators developed in the RUN project can serve as a starting point to better un-derstand these linkages and identify the most relevant data needed.

The Monitor Nachhaltige Kommune project aims to support the development of "effect-oriented" sustainability management in German communities. The project, lead by the Bertelsmann Foundation, is divided into several project modules. ICLEI´s part in this project builds the foundation of indicator based monitoring. It provides the knowledge and training for local governments to change their governance instruments with the aim of becoming more sustainable.
Within this framework ICLEI developed a governance self assessment tool for local governments, developed hand books for urban sustainability governance
and was further responsible for the coaching of local governments in implementing new governance approaches.
ICLEI also takes part in the strategic advisory council of the overall project.

Promoting the project and its results among multiple beneficiaries is an important goal of the project. ICLEI therefor develops, implements, and monitors a detailed strategy for communication, dissemination, and exploitation. ICLEI will thereby safeguard the implementation and replication of developed solutions beyond the project’s lifetime. ICLEI will further develop a typology of city types that recognises different contexts.

ICLEI Europes task within this activity is to validate, enrich and share SONNET results, maximising their exploitation and impact, drawing upon a well-designed knowledge brokerage and co-creation process within and beyond the project. It implements cutting edge dissemination processes to maximize SONNET’s impact by engaging a variety of key stakeholders at local, regional, national and European levels, drawing on insights derived from the different workpackages. SONNET utilizes multiple channels and formats (incl. social media, regional workshops, briefs for practitioners,
infographics, videos) to disseminate its findings to all relevant stakeholders.
Specific objectives of ICLEI Europe are:
– Coordination of the co-creation and dissemination process
– Translating SONNET’s results into actionable recommendations for policy makers
– Development and dissemination of novel and cutting-edge scientific knowledge