News

Local Green Deals enable businesses, the municipality and all inhabitants to actively commit and contribute to becoming more sustainable. Cities can lead the way, but they need committed and active local partners to manage the sustainability transition. 

Cities actively implementing Local Green Deals recently met in Umeå (Sweden) in a knowledge exchange organised by the ALLIANCE project, to take a closer look at Umeå’s Climate Roadmap. The city has so far won over 50 local partners to sign-up and commit to tackling climate challenges ranging from the IT sector, to building companies to the automotive sector, including big employers like Volvo. 

“Umeå’s Climate Roadmap is a huge puzzle”, says Annika Myren, Development Strategist at the City of Umeå. “We work very closely with networks for example in the building or restaurant sector and support their activities as an intermediary and by making their activities visible to the public. We need to show them that the climate transition is an opportunity for their business.”

A key challenge for Umea now is to manage an increasing number of signatories, and to monitor and measure the impact of the Local Green Deal implementation. The design of the deals, their monitoring as well as financing were discussed together with the partner cities of Mannheim and Espoo, and engaged participants from external organisations, including cities from Denmark, the Netherlands, Italy, Croatia, as well as business network organisations like the Impact Hub. 

Images from Umea.