Sds in Action - Strategic Sdg Foresight Case European Sdg-cities

About the workshop and URBACT CSG Network
Cities are urged to set ambitious ecological goals for climate and biodiversity while managing social and economic sustainability. No European city has yet achieved the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), although they are a great fit for cities to develop their governance. There is an “action gap” between the ambitions set and what is being achieved.
Cities for Sustainability Governance (CSG) are using the SDGs as a vehicle for implementing strategic urban governance and deliver on the promise of transforming our world, as set out in the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. See: https://urbact.eu/9-cities-9-stories-cities-sustainability-governance & https://urbact.eu/networks/cities-sustainability-governance .
As a fundamental process in this, CSG uses the SDG Analyses – tool, which is used to a) identify key themes for development, b) analyse that in relation to all 17 SDGs, c) design new concrete objectives and indicators for them, and finally d) reflect on holistic sustainable development and create future foresight.
Everything starts with creating a shared direction locally. In CSG, we promote the use of the SDGs to create shared visions and holistic long-term strategies that meet local needs and challenges. Some cities are already frontrunners on this topic, and they integrate the SDGs into their design, execution, and monitoring. Other cities have the opportunity to start making more strategic use of SDGs based on peer-to-peer learnings through this process. SDGs are a great support in city level strategic SDG driven future foresight and with the right processes they affect our mindset and knowledge of holistic sustainable development as well.
A) This event aims to present how SDGs can be used in so called “localization” process in order to create strategic, holistic and future oriented action to achieve the SDGs. It happens through a facilitated and dialogue driven approach using “The SDG Analyses” -process, which is based on experiences of European and global cities. Results show that 92% to 95% of the civil servants, decision makers and other stakeholder groups that go through the facilitated process learn more about holistic sustainable development through SDGs affecting their sustainability mindset as well.
B) Secondly event aims to provide an interactive platform for knowledge exchange and the sharing of best practices. It will also link with the Going Glocal: Experiences of SDG localization for multilevel and multi-regional partnerships, which will frame the high-level discussion, while this one will provide hands-on, interactive knowledge.