World Urban Forum in Medellín: The OAS Takes Regional Experiences to Center Stage

This month, a reported 142 countries, 139 Mayors, 42 Ministers, and more than 22,000 people participated in the Seventh session of the World Urban Forum (WUF7) convened by the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) in Medellín, Colombia with support from the government. What is arguably the World’s premier conference on cities featured a plethora of expert speakers in plenary sessions, dialogues, roundtables, training and networking events. One of such networking events, entitled “Clean Energy and Transport Solutions in an Urban Hemisphere: Lessons from the Americas” was co-hosted by the OAS-SEDI Department of Sustainable Development and the U.S. government on April 10, 2014.

Experienced practitioners from four cities in the Americas -who have received support from the OAS and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)- presented successful strategies and tools that promote the use of clean energy and innovative, practical transport solutions. Project implementers from San Jose (Costa Rica), Salt Lake City (USA), Baja Verapaz Department (Guatemala), and New York (USA) shared their experience, lessons learned and best practices for replicating similar sustainability initiatives in other cities around the world, highlighting the role of community engagement for project ownership and sustainability.

At the event, the OAS and the U.S. Mission to the OAS announced the launch of the second phase of the  “Sustainable Cities and Communities in the Americas” Project, which includes a sum of U$400,000 of new grant opportunities for grass root initiatives related to the promotion of urban sustainability.

“The United States believes that the development of more sustainable, resilient cities and communities in Latin America and the Caribbean is important for the hemisphere’s long-term economic growth and prosperity, efficient use and development of energy, and the protection of our environment and human health” said Ambassador Carmen Lomellin, U.S. permanent representative to the OAS at the event. 

Executive Secretary for Integral Development of the OAS, Sherry Tross, highlighted that “last year, when we launched the first round of 14 grants, we had great expectations. Those expectations have been met, and in many cases, surpassed. These projects that are almost completed have contributed valuable information on capacity building, technology transfer, and citizen participation -- and generated replicable projects that are suitable for scaling up.”

Secretary Tross made special mention of accomplishments in beneficiary countries, including a recycling initiative in Grenada that uses fish waste to manufacture a protein product that will lower the cost of poultry feed and significantly improve the livelihoods of Grenada’s farmers while avoiding putting noxious organic wastes in the local landfill. “This project has scaled up and just received an additional $250,000 from the IDB” stated Secretary Tross.

“Success is infectious” she added, explaining that the new tranche of grants will be awarded on a competitive basis to community associations, academic institutions and non-governmental organizations in OAS member countries in Central America and the Caribbean in order to finance community collaborative Sub-projects across four different pillars - clean energy and energy efficiency, resilience to natural hazards, sustainable transport solutions, and waste management.