Competition launched for cities to win US$100 million

At the opening of today’s 4th Global Forum on Urban Resilience and Adaptation in Bonn, Germany, the Rockefeller Foundation announced its Resilient Cities Centennial Challenge through which 100 cities will receive technical and financial support for developing and implementing plans for urban resilience.

On the centenary of the establishment of the Rockefeller Foundation in 1913, the philanthropic organisation has unveiled a US$100 million commitment to support the development of urban resilience.

“The cities who join this effort will get the ability to hire a Chief Resilience Officer, technical assistance on how to leverage billions of dollars in public and private infrastructure financing, and the opportunity to join a network with the other 99 cities to share what works and learn from what doesn’t,” said Heather Grady, Vice President of Foundation Initiatives, Rockefeller Foundation, in her address at the opening plenary session.

Beginning in August this year, city leaders or major institutions within cities can nominate their city through a formal application process. Winning cities will be announced in three rounds over three years with the final round in 2015.

“City governments are on the front line of planning for their countries and our planet’s future,” said Grady. “And support for collaboration is both vital and hard to find and we believe philanthropy is in a position to fuel the sort of innovation to enable sustainable and equitable growth.”

One of the key workshops on day one of the forum focused on the Rockefeller Foundation’s support for the Asian Cities Climate Change Resilience Network, a nine-year initiative aimed at building climate change resilience among vulnerable and poor urban communities in Asia.

ICLEI, the organiser of Resilient Cities 2013, unveiled a new guide and toolkit aimed at helping municipal governments in Asia build City Resilience Strategies to cope with the growing impacts of climate change as part of its engagement with the Asian Cities Climate Change Resilience Network (ACCCRN).

“The completion of the new guide and toolkit marks an important milestone in efforts to scale up ACCCRN initiatives to more cities and new countries everywhere so that they can prepare for and enable a swifter recovery to shocks and stresses that are only going to increase in frequency and scale,” said Grady.

The ACCCRN programme began with 10 core cities in four Asian countries : Indonesia, Vietnam, Thailand and India. ICLEI is using its grant to directly engage up to 40 new cities in India, Indonesia, the Philippines and Bangladesh to plan similar urban climate change resilience interventions.

New municipalities which will take part include Barisal Municipal Corporation, Singra Municipality and Mongla Municipality in Bangladesh; Shillong Municipal Corporation, Leh Municipality and City Corporation of Panaji in India; Quezon City and Makati in the Philippines and Sukabumi and Cimahi cities in Indonesia.

As part of the ICLEI-ACCCRN program, cities will undergo a process lasting approximately 12 months to develop City Resilience Strategies that can be incorporated into their planning processes.