My heart beats with competition. I don’t know where to look when people say that participation is more important than winning. Drone show at the closing ceremony of the 2019 SEA GAMES, The Philippines I leave that part of parenting of my children to my husband. My voice is loud and convincing when I sing […]
Today I am in Brussels with the Renew Europe group of the European Parliament. The roundtable session puts Members of the European Parliament, implementers of EU programmes and analysts together to discuss the effectiveness of EU policies in displacement and migration. Migration links dynamics within the EU with those at its borders and in the […]
In Tunisia we currently have no less than four projects: one Dutch, one Canadian and two EU. All of them involve the Fédération Nationale des Villes Tunisiennes, the Tunesian LGA, in some way. This association, a longtime partner of VNG, has its yearly general assembly now. Tunisia is seriously forging ahead with decentralisation, and even […]
“Responsibility as a goal, friendship as a means”. That is how Mr. Wim van de Donk, King’s Commissioner for the Dutch province of Noord-Brabant characterised their partnership with the Chinese province of Jiangsu. It also applies to the partnership between the Dutch city of Oss and the city of Taizhou (in Jiangsu province). I was […]
Jeroen Diepemaat, alderman of the Dutch municipality of Enschede, and Julian Baskin, special advisor at Cities Alliance, Members of the advisory committee of the Governance of Inclusive Green Growth in Cities (DEALS) programme set foot on the ground in Kumasi (Ghana) and Sèmè-Podji (Benin) from 2-4 of October 2019. They were accompanied in both cities […]
VNG International is since September part of the international YEP network. YEP – the Young Expert Programme enables Dutch organisations to offer their young Dutch and local professionals the opportunity to take their first steps in an international environment. The YEP Programmes are carried out jointly by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Netherlands Water […]
As some of you might know, last years’ annual meeting of the Capacity and Institution Building (CIB) Working Group of United Cities and Local Governments saw a discussion on monitoring and evaluation of programmes of CIB members. In that discussion, the idea arose to organize a peer evaluation for one or more of our programmes, […]
European Commission grants San José Metropolitan Area project for sustainable urban mobility MUEVE –Movilidad Sostenible, Urbanismo, Equipamiento, Valoración del Espacio Público, y Enverdecimiento y Equidad – is a five year partnership between Costa Rican and European local authorities to support regional integrated mobility planning in all areas where the metropolitan electric train is planned to […]
Last week, Jan van Zanen, Chairman of the Association of Netherlands Municipalities (VNG) attended the High-Level Political Forum 2019 in New York, as part of the official delegation of the Kingdom of The Netherlands. My colleague Jessie and I supported Van Zanen during his trip to New York. Being part of the national delegation once […]
Gender equality is nothing but an idea if not put into practice. I understood that quite quickly after having started working. Gender equality cannot be reduced to a concept, a buzz term, or a bullet point on our checklists, it should be a reality. It is one of the greatest challenges of our times because […]
A kitchen window blown from its frame; rain slanting horizontally inwards; part of the roof torn into the sky; tropical storm Idai struck the home of Peter van Tongeren on 14 March this year. The experience added an extra dimension to his subsequent role in the reconstruction of Beira, the city in Mozambique where he […]
On the 25th of June VNG International supported the Government of Sint Maarten in organizing the largest Hurricane Exercise (HUREX) Sint Maarten has seen of yet. A total of approximately 160 government officials, including Fire Department, Ambulance, Police and the Marines, participated in the HUREX 2019. By simulating an actual hurricane scenario in real time, […]
