Learning Together Across Continents

The event was officially opened by Teckla Uwanga, Vice-Mayor of the City of Windhoek. She wished the participants lots of luck in coming up with good ideas for projects to overcome the challenges of climate change. A second opening address was held by Clemens Olbrich, Manager of the Municipal Climate Partnerships Project, which is being implemented by the Service Agency Communities in One World – which also co-organised the conference. He underlined the importance of working in partnership, and emphasised how important it was to establish joint working structures and forms of communication. These will provide the foundation for successful joint projects following the two-year project phase, he added.

After that the African and Latin American delegations were given an opportunity to introduce themselves to each other so that they could identify joint topics and discover starting points for bilateral conversations. Later on in the day the delegations formed breakout groups, where they discussed progress and challenges when developing their programmes of action together with their German partners. Since the kick-off workshop in Bremen all the climate partnerships have succeeded in identifying joint focal themes, and are now busy formulating joint objectives and measures. Some climate partnerships have even already drafted a first version of their programme of action. The project missions that have taken place since the kick-off meeting made an important contribution to this.

The agenda for day two included specialist excursions. These were preceded by atalk delivered by Olavi Makuti, Environmental Specialist at the City of Windhoek, on the impacts of climate change in Namibia and the wide array of climate change mitigation and adaptation measures being taken by the City of Windhoek.The greatest challenge for Windhoek, he explained, was to continuously improve and optimise water management. Advancing climate change is exacerbating the country's water scarcity, which is already acute, he added. The destinations for the excursions were therefore also selected for their focus on water and waste-water management. Participants visited various water and sewage treatment plants – as well as a hazardous waste processing facility. The feedback from participants was highly positive, as the four excursions enabled them to understand in depth how water is managed and recycled.

On day three – the final day of the meeting – participants once again focused on their work in conjunction with the programmes of action. Darby Gounden from Buffalo City Metro in South Africa reported on her experiences in this connection. Partnered with Oldenburg, Buffalo City had taken part in the third phase of the Climate Partnerships Project. The agenda for day three also included a World Caféon the topics 'gender and climate change', 'water and solid waste management', 'renewable energy' and 'information work, communication and cooperation with German municipalities'. Here participants had an opportunity to compare notes on specialist issues and specific challenges, and forge links with other municipalities working on the same topics with their respective German partners.Finally, Clemens Olbrich provided participants with information on further supportoffered by the Service Agency, and Moritz Schmidt of LAG 21 NRW summarised the next steps toward finalising the programmes of action

At the end of the network meeting participants summed up their experiences very favourably. They reported that they had made valuable new contacts, and obtained answers to questions concerning the next steps in the partnership process. They were particularly appreciative of the expert dialogue and mutual learning on municipal activities for climate change mitigation and adaptation. Everyone involved is confident that the next milestones on the road to completing the project in October 2019 will be reached successfully.
The meeting ending on a festive note with an evening reception at Windhoek CityHall, which lifted everyone's spirits. In his closing address, Mayor Muesee Kazapua wished all participants the best of luck when preparing and implementing their programmes of action.