Planned under a virtual format, The Nature Of Cities Festival (TNOC) pushed boundaries to radically imagine our cities for the future across 5 days with programming across all regional time zones and provided in multiple languages. It offered the ability to truly connect local place and ideas on a global scale for a much broader perspective and participation than any one physical meeting in any one city could ever have achieved.
The TNOC festival gathered over 1500 participants online from 22-26 February 2021 and featured numerous panelists across dedicated keynote speakers, plenary dialogues, seed sessions, field trips, micro-talks and art happenings, on top of an Ecological Urban Arts Exhibition.
The Post 20202 Biodiversity Framework.EU support project, through its partnerships with ICLEI Cities Biodiversity Center, sponsored several activities across the Festival.
Seed session – Financing the green cities that we want !
On 23 February, this session took the form of a round table discussion and brought together development finance institutions (DFIs), finance experts and innovators, and city representatives together to engage and share insights on innovative finance approaches, products and solutions that cities could access to accelerate investment and transition in green and blue infrastructure, a green recovery, and green procurement, in order to restore ecosystems and their contribution to people and protect biodiversity. It provided opportunity for selected cities to present a project concept/financing challenge from their respective cities, to the DFIs and experts and explore potential biodiversity finance avenues and innovative solutions.
The session was moderated by Akanksha Khatri from the World Economic Forum – Nature for Action Programme. It featured as guest speakers :
- Agence Française de Dévelopement (AFD) – Fréderic Audras
- Bankers without Boundaries (WWB) – Alexander Wiese
- FAO – Action Against Desertification Programme – Great Green Wall
- UN Capital Development Fund (UNCDF) – Rafael Moser
- Kochi City Mayor (India)
- Campinas City Mayor (Brazil)
Plenary dialogue – Urban biodiversity: what are the top things the CBD’s post 2020 biodiversity goals need to accomplish in relation to cities?
Held on 25 February 2021, the dialogue discussed the necessary conditions that the Post 2020 biodiversity framework must address to facilitate a transition towards sustainable production and consumption in cities and urban areas. Sizing the window of opportunity to build back better and greener after covid-19 crisis, the session explored the challenges of growing and uncontrolled urbanization, especially in Africa and Coastal areas, and the interdependencies between cities and the biosphere. To promote regenerative cities, it aimed at facilitating commitments by local and subnational stakeholders but also their supporting partners and investors.
The session was moderated by Ingrid Coetzee from ICLEI’s Cities Biodiversity Centre (CBC). It featured as guest speakers :
- Expertise France – Didier Babin, Paris
- International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) – Chantal van Ham, Brussels
- Stockholm Resilience Centre – Thomas Elmqvist, Stockholm;
Booth on CitiesWithNature platform
All across the Festival, a booth showcasing the CitiesWithNature platform proposed to participants for cities and their partners to engage and connect, working with shared commitment towards a more sustainable urban world.
Access the CitiesWithNature booth
