Inclusive guide helps communities build urban resilience

In The News 17 Mar 2021

The new Urban Action Kit, launched by the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) and the Climate Centre, and supported by EIT Climate-KIC and partners, offers a guidebook and activity cards for community organisations working on urban climate resilience. The kit features a case study from EIT Climate-KIC’s Resilient Regions Deep Demonstration.

According to the IPCC, in the next 30 years, about 70 million people will move to urban areas every single year. By 2050, two-thirds of the global population will live in cities. Climate change effects like flash floods, heatwaves and droughts increasingly threaten citizens, revealing an urgent need for city climate action. 

The Urban Action Kit is a set of resources, including videos, to help volunteer networks in cities mitigate and adapt to climate change. It’s available in 12 languages and covers topics ranging from communications, nature-based solutions, water and sanitation, urban agriculture, health, early warning, early action and liveability.

“The need for sustainable measures to build resilience is growing due to climate change, and local government, communities, the Red Cross Red Crescent, the private sector and academia can together foster sustainable, green and inclusive urban development,” said IFRC Secretary General Jagan Chapagain.

“Urbanisation is transformative,” he concluded. “It catalyses sharing of social, cultural and natural capital, but the path to sustainability starts with inclusive and scalable local action.”

Each module of the kit contains an overview, activities, case studies and a global link. The activities can be implemented together or separately and were designed with limited resources in mind.

The case study, “Cartoon-a-thons to explore complex urban issues and transformation,” is based on work done by the EIT Climate-KIC Resilient Regions Deep Demonstration and, specifically, an accompanying cartoon-a-thon held in July 2020 that explored the following questions: What is system-scale intervention? How do we center community in our climate resilience efforts? And, how do we help transition away from short-term thinking and mindsets? Representatives of regions participating in the Deep Demonstration were invited to take part, including Spain’s Andalucia region, France’s Nouvelle-Aquitaine region, the Italian Dolomites and Scotland’s Glasgow region. 

The Urban Action Kit was developed by the IFRC and Climate Centre, the GDPC, Wetlands International and the Resurgence group, with support from the German and Netherlands Red Cross, Partners for Resilience and EIT Climate-KIC.

 
Location
Related Focus Area
Urban Transitions
Related Goal
Goal 3: Accelerate clean urban mobility

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