2016 marked the end of an important period in which nations sought political consensus around the global development agenda. They came to agree that sustainable development should, in fact, be the global agenda for change, consequently adopting major international agreements, like the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda and the Paris Climate Agreement in 2015. The New
Dear ICLEI Friends and Colleagues, Cities around the world have a crucial role in the transition to sustainable consumption and production by using sustainable public procurement (SPP) as a key tool. By introducing sustainable criteria in our purchases, local and regional governments are making our societies more sustainable, while at the same time ensuring social
Dear ICLEI friends and colleagues, To advance sustainable transport globally, the City of Kaohsiung will host the 3rd EcoMobility World Festival and Congress in October 2017. Today, over 90 percent of Kaohsiung residents use private cars or motorized scooters to go about their daily lives, contributing to air and noise pollution, traffic jams and accidents
Ambitious cities around the world are setting their sights on becoming carbon neutral. This means that, after measuring their carbon emissions, they reduce those emissions as much as is cost effectively possible, and use equivalent offsets to balance the residual emissions and achieve a net zero carbon footprint. Copenhagen is one of those ambitious cities.
This blog post was written by Ana Marques, Low Carbon Cities Senior Officer at ICLEI World Secretariat. In April 2015, Councilor Jinty MacTavish of Dunedin, New Zealand made a compelling presentation on fossil fuel divestment at the ICLEI World Congress in Seoul. Since then, Dunedin has finalized a policy on ethical investments and divested from
Dear ICLEI friends and colleagues, Local and subnational governments have proven to be a reliable force for positive global change. Now, in 2017, it is vital that we push to make the trend towards sustainable development irreversible. We aim to do so through our actions on the ground, efforts to shape global policy and events
By Andrea Erickson, Managing Director, Water Security The journey of our water from source to tap is long, and not one we think much about. For most of us, our water starts high in the mountains, hundreds of miles away. From there, water flows across natural and working lands until a portion is channeled to
As the world rapidly urbanizes, city governments are preparing to manage the increasing volumes of solid waste generated by inhabitants. Ten years ago, cities were collectively managing around 0.7 billion tons of waste each year – a figure projected to grow to 2.2 billion tons by 2025 as the urban population and per capita waste
A focus on action at the United Nations Climate Change Conference COP22, the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Marrakech, Morocco, was the first Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change following the adoption and swift ratification of the Paris Agreement. It was a COP of action and
Local and subnational governments have an important role to play in supporting implementation of the Paris Agreement, and are already taking action. Their contributions to mitigating greenhouse gas emissions are critical, particularly given that national climate commitments are not yet on track to achieve the Paris Agreement targets. In fact, recent analyses by the United