Joint organisers: ICLEI Europe and Eurocities
This Side Event of the European Weeks of Regions and Cities (EWRC) aims to inspire and support cities to evolve their urban greening journeys. The session will focus on city administrations that would like to better understand the process and effort involved in aligning local urban greening strategies with the wider EU policy framework and the ambitious aims of the Biodiversity Strategy for 2030.
Pioneering cities have produced a treasure trove of lessons learnt, tools and methodologies to mainstream nature-based solutions (NBS) and urban greening initiatives into policy, legislative, governance and citizen engagement structures. EU-funded projects have facilitated this progress, including CLEVER Cities, Connecting Nature and the CONEXUS project, in which the EUKN is an active partner.
Session speakers:
- Benjamin Caspar, EU Policy on the Urban Environment, DG Environment, European Commission
- Hanna Zdanowska (PL/EPP), member of the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) & Mayor of Łódź, Poland
- Martin Krekeler, Hamburg Senate Chancellery and coordinator of the CLEVER Cities project, will present the city’s efforts to promote urban nature, protect cultural and natural landscapes, rivers and streams and create ecological corridors
- Antonio Prieto González, Environment Division, A Coruña City Council and partner in the Connecting Nature project, will introduce the Connecting Nature NBS Framework, a process tool to help cities and other organisations develop technical, governance, financing and monitoring solutions for implementing NBS
- Riccardo Saraco, from the City of Turin and partner in the CONEXUS and ProGIreg projects, will share key lessons learnt from the city’s 20-years-in-the-making green reinvention. He will explore the added value of EU resources to test and deliver local strategies such as the city’s Climate Resilience Plan and Strategic Green Infrastructure Plan, piloting innovative actions ranging from urban brownfield reclamation to urban forestry and renaturalisation.