Alongside the recent G7 Summit held in Japan last month, a Parallel Session on ‘The Role of Cities’ was held in the city of Toyama on 15 May, convened by the Ministry of the Environment, Toyama City Government, the G7 Toyama Environment Ministers’ Meeting Cooperation Committee and the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies (IGES). The Parallel Session was attended by Mayors from cities in the G7, including Bristol in the UK and Frankfurt in Germany, as well as other organisations.
The Parallel Session, addressed by Parliamentary Vice-Minister Makoto Oniki, was convened with the following objectives:
i. Share innovative approaches and good practices for protecting the environment and responding to a new social structure by selected Mayors/Governors of leading local governments from G7 countries and discussing ways forward; and
ii. Discuss the role of the national government to support local governments in promoting and scaling up the aforementioned environmental actions.
A full summary of the Session and the mayors’ presentations can be found at the IGES website.
Also last month the Mayor of Toyama City, Masashi Mori, hosted a signing ceremony at City Hall to formalise a collaboration agreement between the IGES and 100 Resilient Cities – Pioneered by The Rockefeller Foundation (100RC). With the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU), IGES becomes a Platform Partner to the 100RC Initiative, expanding opportunities to leverage the institute’s expertise in climate change mitigation and adaptation to support resilience strategy formulation in 100RC member cities.
The Memorandum signed in Toyama recognises IGES as a strong regional partner in fields such as climate change mitigation and adaptation, transport planning and the analysis of co-benefits of climate related interventions. The 100RC platform provides tools and services to its global network of member cities to build urban resilience. With the signing of the MOU, IGES becomes a 100RC Platform Partner for a three-year period and will aim to support selected 100RC member cities in the Asia-Pacific region through research and policy advice (more at the IGES website). The 100RC website also profiles Toyama and its Chief Resilience Officer.
