EUROPEAID
On 25 September 2015, the Member States of the United Nations agreed on the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) of the 2030 Agenda. On 24 and 25 September 2019, the first-ever SDG Summit took place in New York at UN headquarters. In the same week the Global Climate Strike was happening worldwide.
The campaign has an informational, educational and advocacy character and its main goal is to raise awareness on the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which in many countries is still generally poorly known by citizens, as it emerged from the surveys conducted by project partners in nine of the cities at the center of the project (Modena, Forlì, Reggio Emilia, Vejle, Falkoeping, Split, Shkoder, Poznan, Pemba). Different targets are involved in different project activities: from the multilateral consultations to the trainings, from the local campaigns and to the multimedia outputs, all activities will be realized with active participation and direct involvement of regional institutions and municipalities, local authorities, civil servants, grassroot organisations, and citizens.
17 is the total number of UN SDGs, like 17 are the partners of the project, from ten EU countries and two non EU (see the full list of partners at the end of this document). Thanks to this international and multi-stakeholder partnership, the action will promote the crucial role of local governments in the implementation of the new set of goals, paving the road to local 2030 Agenda plans. It will mobilize local authorities in implementing the SDGs by addressing the migration challenges and the related local policies with a strong gender approach (SDG5), promoting a peaceful and inclusive societies (SDG16), making cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable (SDG11) and acting to combat climate change and its impacts (SDG13).
The beginning of the international campaign has been introduced by a 'countdown' on the project facebook page (@shapingfaircitiesEU), during which each of the 17 project partners presented one of the 17 SDGs linking it to their local contexts. The international campaign will promote the actions, contents and activities by the different partners during their local campaigns, which will take place until the end of 2020.
As part of the project, Emilia-Romagna Region has published a call for proposals directed to local authorities to carry out communication and awareness campaigns which, in an innovative and effective way, increase awareness and mobilize citizens in favor of implementation of the 2030 Agenda in our cities. The goal is to involve as many local authorities of the Region (Municipalities, Metropolitan Cities and Unions of Municipalities), civil society organizations and citizens as possible in the process of localization of sustainable development objectives. In the final phase of the project Emilia-Romagna Region will organize the „Fair Cities Days”, a three-day European event in Bologna which will take place in 2020 during the regional campaign involving representatives, local authorities, company directors, experts and professors in workshops, conferences and debates with the aim of creating a synergy between politics and companies and launching a strategic debate on the implementation of development policies at city level.
The official coordinator of the campaign are: ROPS - Regional Centre of Social Policy from Poland and WeWorld-GVC from Italy, with the supervision and coordination of Emilia-Romagna Region, lead partner of the project.
