Scaling Up Local Solutions to Global Challenges through Multilevel Governance

With the UN Summit of the Future on the horizon and only few years remaining to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), this session positions local action as the cornerstone of achieving the 2030 SDG targets, building sustainable cities and ensuring the quality of life of citizens. While the 2030 Agenda sets a global framework, 65% of the SDGs targets relate with local and regional government competences. Its successful achievement hinges on effective multilevel governance and the vertical alignment of policies, from the global, to the local level.

By bringing actors at the Global, European, National and Local level, this session emphasises the importance of multilevel governance and multi stakeholder engagement. It underlines the need for local ownership, based on examples of Voluntary Local Review, and supporting cities integrating the SDGs into their public policies, considering their specific context, needs and resources.

Listening to the cities and learning from its many successful examples and the exchange of experiences between Europe, Eastern Europe and Central Asia allows to capitalise different lessons learned and inspire others to advance together to the successful achievement of the SDGs.

In this session we will be learning about the support offered by UN HABITAT SDG Cities Global Initiative and other UN Agencies supporting the development of VLRs. Cities from Europe and Central Asia will showcase their experiences. We will also learn about the support offered by the Reference Framework for Sustainable Cities (RFSC) - a self-assessment tool to design and assess local strategies and the SDGs and European goals - supported by the Council of European Municipalities and Regions and the French Ministry for Ecological Transition and Territorial Cohesion. Moreover, we will learn how cities will be benefit from a one a kind repository of specific actions stemming from all Voluntary Local Reviews published to date, developed by the European Commission Joint Research Centre, acting as a peer learning platform for cities at SDG target level.

While it is necessary to evaluate the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs, and share experiences that allow to accelerate progress, this session also aims to contribute to shaping the post-2030 Agenda by analysing successful examples of multi-level governance, and by providing a platform to discuss challenges, success stories and ways forward.