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Climate Resilience

Theme

Urban Resilience - Resilient Cities - Netherlands Water Partnership

Contact

Janett Tapia

Project Manager Urban Resilience

+31 70 304 3700

j.tapia@nwp.nl

The world’s population is growing fast and the number of people living in cities is increasing rapidly. At the same time, climate change is bringing new challenges for these growing populations: heat stress in cities; diminished water supply for communities, agriculture and industry; irregular rain patterns; extreme weather events; affected coastal areas due to sea level rise; and even pandemics. The need to build resilience to secure liveability, ecological well-being and economic viability for communities in the midst of these new shocks and stressors presents new opportunities for international cooperation. As resilience and water experts work around the world on similar challenges, building partnerships and collaborations can allow us to integrate knowledge, technology and tools to provide solutions adapted to serve local needs.

Cities all over the world are getting more familiar with the challenges and consequences of climate change. In the past, extreme weather events occurred once in a lifetime, but now their frequency and negative impacts have become more common. Doing nothing is not an option. The need to develop resilient cities is imminent. Within the framework of the Dutch Government's Partners for Water Programme, the Netherlands Water Partnership (NWP) is forming a Dutch resilience network to help partners around the world connect with Dutch organisations to work together on new resilience knowledge, techniques and tools in cooperation with local partners.

Forging partnerships

An integrated systems approach is vital to make cities, coastal communities and rural areas resilient. Joining forces across different roles and angles allows us to transition to resilient systems where all parts of society are working towards these common goals. That is why the NWP Urban Resilience team works together with national and international city mayors and administrators, water leaders, investors, global banks, knowledge institutions, businesses, NGOs, networking organisations and community groups to work on resilience in a collaborative way.

Forging long-term relationships, building partnerships and exchanging knowledge can stimulate new solutions and lead to innovation. The NWP Urban Resilience team enables the Dutch water sector to liaise with partners around the world wishing to engage with Dutch expertise in order to learn and act towards building resilient solutions.

Enhancing the resilience network

The Urban Resilience team shares, connects and involves with the vibrant international community focused on resilience. As more partners in more countries are joining these efforts, the community is growing. In recent years, we have gathered at the Amsterdam International Water Week, World Water Forum Brazil, the World Cities Summit, the Stockholm World Water Week, the IWA Congress & Exhibition, and the COP24 in Katowice, to name a few global stages. NWP participates and supports these gatherings in close collaboration with partners such as the Special Envoy for International Water Affairs of the Government of the Netherlands, Henk Ovink, to advocate for more international cooperation. By staying connected to the Urban Resilience team, you can stay connected with the international resilience family and exchange ideas, solutions and dialogue with Dutch experts on the field.

How can you get involved?

If you are a Dutch organisation working on urban (or other kinds of) resilience, join our Dutch Resilience Hub for NWP to match you with opportunities, and submit some project examples for the Dutch Resilience Portfolio so that we can further promote your flagship projects.

If you are an international organisation wishing to explore possible ways to partner up with Dutch organisations around resilience-related topics, contact the Urban Resilience team at resilience@nwp.nl indicating your full name, organisation's name, country and phone number (including country code).