Local Solutions, Global Impact The Role of Small and Medium Cities in Accelerating Climate Action

While megacities dominate discussions on urban sustainability, the critical role of the smaller in accelerating climate action is often overlooked.

In Europe where out of the over 11.000 signatories of the Covenant of Mayors for Climate and Energy, 89% of its signatories have less than 50.000 inhabitants. According to UCLG estimations, 20% of the world's population lives in intermediary cities, those counting 50.000 to 1 million inhabitants.

Bringing some concrete examples from different regions, this session explores the unique potential of intermediary cities to drive innovation and implement effective green solutions tailored to their specific contexts. By experimenting on both mitigation strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adaptation strategies to build resilience to climate change impacts, small and medium-sized cities establish their role as leaders in creating a more sustainable future.

Leveraging on the closer proximity of their community and a deep understanding of the local natural, social and economic ecosystem, they take courageous steps in the climate action process while fostering a just and sustainable future for all thought the engagement of stakeholders such as businesses, academia and civil society.

Despite ambition, intermediary cities often face additional challenges due to limited human and financial resources for infrastructure upgrades, institutional communication, community engagement, process management and in maintaining up to date legislative and technical knowledge.

The underestimation of the role that intermediary cities can play leads to difficulty for them to access schemes, projects and initiatives which are designed for the bigger ones, making it difficult for them to keep the pace needed to achieve the Paris objectives.

The event, organized by the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate and energy (GCoM); the Covenent of Mayors Europe (COMO EU) and UCLG, will bring experiences from the cities of Chefchaouen (Morocco), Växjö (Sweden), Lusaka (Zambia) and Mechelen (Belgium) to showcase how small and medium size cities can make a difference, what actions can be successfully upscaled but also what challenges they face and what support they need in their climate journey to advance at the same speed as the bigger cities.

In an interactive panel discussion, city representatives will bring examples of integration of adaptation and mitigation actions, heating and cooling decarbonization, as well as the city-to-business relations among others.

Questions from the audience will be included in the exchange with panelists which will be split in three rounds of questions, touching on the social, environmental, political and economic aspects of their experiences and, more in general highlighting what would be the favorable conditions for an intermediary city to accelerate the action toward a sustainable and inclusive future.