Rat für Nachhaltige Entwicklung Voluntary Local Reviews (VLRs) connection to national implementation of the 2030 Agenda

Co-hosted by the German Council for Sustainable Development (RNE), the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), the Colombian National Planning Department (DNP) and the Federal Government of Germany

Date: 14th July, 13:15-14:45 EST in New York

Summary: Urban and communal sustainability reporting is growing faster than ever. More and more cities and municipalities have been involved in sustainability reporting, the so-called Voluntary Local Reviews (VLRs). This side-event will discuss the contributions of VLRs for local delivery of the 2030 Agenda as well as their relevance and impulses for national achievements in delivering the 2030 Agenda. The following questions are foreseen to guide the discussion:

In what thematic areas of the 2030 Agenda are municipalities the key actors to drive change and delivery of SDGs?
Where do municipalities share similarities and where are differences in establishing VLRs in various country context settings?
What are the connections and impulses of VLR activities for national delivery of the 2030 Agenda and, conversely, what are the feedback effects of national strategy and reports on municipalities?

This debate will focus on peer exchange across communities for sustainable development and its value-added for national SDG delivery in Colombia and Germany.

Agenda

’00 Welcoming remarks: Dr. Bärbel Kofler, Parliamentary State Secretary to the Federal Minister for Economic Cooperation and Development

Keynotes:

Head of Delegation Colombia (tbd)
Dr. Bettina Hoffmann, Parliamentary State Secretary at the Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation, Nuclear Safety and Consumer Protection (tbc)

’25 Presentation of the VLRs of Pereira (Colombia) and Bonn (Germany)

Carlos Maya López, Mayor of the City of Pereira, Colombia
Katja Dörner, Mayor of the City of Bonn, Germany

’40 Movie with voices from Colombian and German municipalities on their path towards the Global Goals

’45 VLR discussion: Assessing local progress and feeding it into national policy-making for the 2030 Agenda

Katja Dörner, Mayor of the City of Bonn, Germany
Carlos Maya López, Mayor of the City of Pereira, Colombia

National and international reflections on the value-added of VLRs for SDG delivery

Olga Lucia Romero Londoño, Director Public Policy Evaluation Colombian National Planning Department (DNP)– Technical Secretariat for the SDGs, Colombia
Dr. Fernando Ortiz Moya, Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES), Japan (tbc)
Dr. Stefan Bauernfeind, Head of Division Sustainable Development, Federal Chancellery Germany

‘75 Concluding remarks

Dr. Marc-Oliver Pahl, Secretary General, German Council for Sustainable Development

Moderation: Dr. Hannah Janetschek, German Council for Sustainable Development (RNE)
Ivonne Lobos, Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI), Colombia