World, PLATFORMA, Specific Grant Agreement DCI-CSO-LA/2019/405-168 Working together towards empowering local and regional governments for enhanced governance and more effective development outcomes in EU partner countries

General Objective

The General objective of the action is to enhance engagement of EU local and regional governments and their associations in decentralised cooperation, in partnership with peers in partner countries. CEMR-PLATFORMA will continue promoting, advocating for, and contributing to the creation of an enabling environment for EU local and regional governments (LRGs) to sharetheir expertise with LRGs in partner countries, share their political and operational vision at the EU and Member State levels, advocating for better support by local and regional decisionmakers, national governments (Member States), EU institutions as well as global initiatives to decentralised development cooperation. CEMR-PLATFORMA will also continue contributing to improvement of the effectiveness of local and regional governments’ international partnerships with LRGs in partner countries through peer-learning and knowledge exchange initiatives. To meet all these objectives the network’s institutional capacity will be further strengthened to allow for good governance and good coordination to reach joint goals.

Specific objectives

Under the Specific Grant Agreement, four specific objectives will be pursued, which will contribute jointly to the impact of the Action:

1. Networking for action: Awareness-raising and capacity-building for local and regional governments and their associations as development policy actors;
2. Networking for innovation: Improvement of current practice in decentralised cooperation;
3. Networking for advocacy: Strengthening the voice of EU local and regional governments and their associations in EU development policy and global agendas;
4. Networking for value: Boosting synergies and adding value as a network, assuring good governance and sustainable partnerships;

Specific activities VNG International

• Policy analysis – contribution to PLATFORMA policy work
• National focal point work – Frequent contact with Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and permanent representation of The Netherlands at the EU on Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) related policy work
• Global agenda input – input to the Global Taskforce for Local and Regional Governments with regard to SDG activities of Dutch municipalities, at home and in partner countries
• SDG cluster – meetings with PLATFORMA partners on the SDGs, aimed at far reaching knowledge exchange and coordination, on SDG implementation, reporting and learning.
• SDG events – events at national level on SDGs and international cooperation
• SDG reporting work (creation of dashboard with SDG data and indicators in the Netherlands, based on exchange with SALGA)
• Dissemination of international SDG welcome package
• Development and dissemination of SDG VR game (SDG 11)

Types of services provided:

• Policy work
• Contributions to PLATORMA position papers on various aspects related to the SDGs

Annual presence (political and technical) at the UN’s High Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development, where progress on the SDGs is discussed, active contribution in Local and Regional Government’s Forum (SDG good practices from Dutch municipalities and from VNG International projects) and side events on SDG reporting (e.g. sessions on Voluntary Local Reviews)

SDG knowledge exchange

• Publications:
  – The SDGs & local inclusion
  – The SDGs & local democracy
• SDG welcome package for Mayors and councillors (both digital and physical) (EN FR ES)
•  Local SDG indicator set, applicable in international context (ready in Spring 2022)

SDG events/dialogue and exchange

• Organisation of annual SDG meeting for >120 Dutch Global Goals municipalities, with international speakers and workshops, incl. workshops on SDG indicators
• Organisation of annual SDG ‘flag day’ on the 25th of September, leading to more and more Global Goals municipalities
• Regional meetings on various aspects of the SDGsStaff
  Peter Knip, Arthur Wiggers, Jessie Post, Claudia de Laaf, Lingmei Ma, Jane Cowan, Annick DuitBudget available for staff time: 
  69.000