Opening Session

The opening will provide context to urban resilience through contributions from leading local and national governments working on resilience and international organizations with expertise in urban and risk-reduction challenges.

- Ms. Ada Colau, Mayor of Barcelona
- Mr. Lars Gornvald, EC DEVCO
- Ms. Mami Mizutori, Special Representative of UNISDR
- Deputy Executive Director, UN-Habitat

Keynote

Pau GIl, Sant Pau Art Nouveau Site
Monday 12th November 10:45 – 11:15

This keynote address will provide the framework the 2030 Agenda and the challenges, opportunities and conditions necessary to achieve the bold and transformative vision set out in the 2030 Agenda. Concretely, the Sustainable Development Goals along with other key frameworks, New Urban Agenda, Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction, Paris Agreement, call on all parties to commit and cooperate to enhance people, planet, prosperity, peace and partnerships over the coming decade and beyond.

- Ms. Cristina Gallach, High Commissioner for the Agenda 2030, Government of Spain

The session will be in English and Spanish with simultaneous interpretation.

Welcome Cocktail

All participants of Barcelona Resilience Week are invited to the welcome cocktail on Sunday 11th November at the Sant Pau Art Nouveau Site, home of UN-Habitat’s office in Barcelona. Prior confirmation is mandatory, please contact info@cityresilience.org to confirm your attendance.

From altered weather patterns to rising sea levels and more extreme meteorological events, the bearings of climate change impact on people’s wellbeing and livelihoods in different ways. In a rapidly urbanizing world, promoting effective climate action in cities and recognizing that sustainable and resilient urban development cannot be achieved or sustained without mitigation and adaptation measures is essential. This dialogue will address key concerns, issues and approaches to push forward Climate Action for Resilience.

- Mr. Albert Sandy Daniel, Honourable Lord Mayor of Port Vila, Vanuatu
- Mr. Alessandro Attolico, Executive Director, Province of Potenza, Italy
- Ms. Ares Gabàs, Chief Resilience Officer, Barcelona City Council, Spain
- Ms. Laia Romero, Operations and Strategy Director, ISARDSAT - Satellite data for climate action
- Mr. Mark Watts, Executive Director, C40 Yakutsk City Council (representative TBC)

- Ms. Megan Rowling, Journalist, Thomson Reuters

The session will be in English and Spanish with simultaneous interpretation.

The number of urban residents at risk is increasing as rapid urbanization continues to result in sprawl and/or densely populated informal settlements in hazard-prone areas. When cities face sudden shocks (natural or human-made), unplanned urban areas are hit the hardest as they often suffer from underlying or pre-existing stresses and there is a shortage of knowledge about the area or how to respond. In cities with high informality, local capacity and resources may not be sufficient to prepare for and react to risk. This dialogue will explore approaches to understand informality from a resilience perspective.

-Mr. Musa Kualkikaya, Former Ambassador for Turkey in Mauritania

- Mr. Erhan Türbedar, Researcher, Statistical, Economic and Social Research and Training Centre for Islamic Countries
- Mr. Marcos Cáceres, Advisor for Social Affairs, Asuncion City Council, Paraguay
- Ms. Sara Márquez, Arquitectura Sin Fronteras & Mr. César Cunguara, Informal Settlements, Maputo City Council, Mozambique
- Mr. Braulio Eduardo Morera, Director of Strategy Delivery, 100 Resilient Cities
- Mr. Osvaldir Rodrigues, Architect, Praia City Council, Cape Verde

Ms. Carmen Mendoza, Assistant Director of the Barcelona School of Architecture, International University of Catalonia

The session will be in English and Spanish with simultaneous interpretation.

This world needs new resilient ideas to cope with today’s major issues. We know this yet inciting new and innovative action is difficult. While most organizations improve, few renew. This session will highlight the possibilities and opportunities offered by Design Thinking.

- Mr. Boyd Cohen, Dean of Research EADA, CEO Iomob, co-founder Six Fingers Spain
- Mr. Rob Adams, CEO Six Fingers

Presentation of the Intensive Programme in Designing Policies for Resilience of the Elisava Barcelona School of Design and Engineering. The programme aims at empowering agents of positive change for contributing to action and impact for a better society. The session will end with a networking cocktail.

Analyzing decentralization in terms of local governments responsibilities, planning and financial capacity is key for building city resilience. Local governments have a unique role in promoting, ensuring and maintaining urban resilience as they are responsible for a number of key processes related to the functionality of the city. In many cases, local governments are the first line of response in crisis situations and must coordinate efforts among local and national actors. This dialogue will explore how local governments are working local, regional and national partners to build resilience.

- Mr. Alfredo Martinez, Mayor of Santo Domingo Este, Dominican Republic
- Mr. Augustí Serra, Secretary for Land and Sustainably, Generalitat de Catalunya
- Ms. Emilia Saiz, Secretary General, UCLG
- Mr. Joan Clos, Former Executive Director of UN-Habitat
- Mr. Guilherme Johnston, Resilient Cities Program Global Coordinator, ICLEI

Mr. Nicola Tollin, Prof. on Urban Resilience, University of Southern Denmark

The session will be in English and Spanish.

To support cities in developing resilience strategies, the EU-funded Uscore2 project has designed and tested a generic, practical, city-to-city, disaster risk reduction peer review tool for cities across EU member states and beyond via the UNISDR’s Making Cities Resilient campaign.

This Masterclass workshop aims to present the results of the project and the mechanism for an independent and transparent assessment, adding clear value to building local and national resilience. It will emphasize the importance of city-to-city peer learning and sharing of best practices.

Based on their experience gained through the project, local governments will showcase how the tool can assist cities with the challenge of strengthening their implementation of disaster risk reduction.

- Mr. Abhilash Panda, Deputy Director, Regional Office for Europe, UNISDR
- Dr. Kathy Oldham, Chief Resilience Officer, Greater Manchester Combined Authority, UK
- Mr. Luis Carvalho, Coordinator Civil Protection, Amadora City Council, Portugal
- Prof. Duncan Shaw, University of Manchester, UK

The Block by Block project is the work of UN-Habitat together with the makers of the hugely popular world-building computer game Minecraft, Mojang. Since 2012, they have used the game to engage communities all over the world — particularly young people, women and slum dwellers – in the design of their local public spaces, and have now reached more than 25 countries. Kenya, Peru, Haiti and Nepal are among the nations to have Block by Block-designed spaces.

“Urban Resilience for Risk and Adaptation Governance. Theory and Practice” is the first volume of the book series “Resilient City: Re-thinking Urban Transformation” published by Springer. The Series has been envisioned to analyse the contemporary challenges faced by cities and provide an up-to-date body of knowledge, including a systematic collection of global cutting-edge best practices, fundamental to managing the urban transition toward resilience.

This book brings together a series of theory and practice essays on risk management and adaptation in urban contexts within a resilient and multidimensional perspective. The book proposes a transversal approach with regard to the role of spatial planning in promoting and fostering risk management as well as institutions’ challenges for governing risk, particularly in relation to new forms of multi-level governance that may include stakeholders and citizen engagement. The different contributions focus on approaches, policies, and practices able to contrast risks in urban systems generating social inclusion, equity and participation through bottom-up governance forms and co-evolution principles.

- Grazia Brunetta. Politecnico di Torino. Interuniversity Department of Regional and Urban Studies and Planning, Scientific Coordinator, Responsible Risk Resilience Centre - R3C.
- Ombretta Caldarice. Politecnico di Torino. Interuniversity Department of Regional and Urban Studies and Planning, Scientific Coordinator, Responsible Risk Resilience Centre - R3C.
- Nicola Tollin. University of Southern Denmark. Department of Civil and Architectural Engineering.
- Jordi Morató. Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya. UNESCO Chair on Sustainability.
- Esteban Leon. Head, City Resilience Profiling Programme (CRPP), UN-Habitat.

- Mikkel K. Kragh, University of Southern Denmark. Department of Civil and Architectural Engineering.

Building urban resilience takes multiple forms, but must inevitably seek to improve the lives of all people and maintain development gains when cities face shocks, stresses and challenges. The urban poor are exposed to greater risks than their wealthier counterparts and often lose a greater share of their assets or resources in the process. Vulnerable groups such as indigenous populations, women, the elderly and the disabled often lack the necessary safety nets to recover from shocks.

This dialogue will focus on the measure necessary to ensure urban resilience measures reach and work for all city inhabitants.

- Mr. Emil Boc, Mayor of the City of Cluj-Napoca, Romania
- Ms. Laura Pérez, Councillor for International Cooperation and LGTBI, Barcelona City Council, Spain
- Mr. Erick Elysio Reis Amorim, Teresina City Council, Brazil
- Mr. Luis Nhaca, Councillor for urban planning and environment, Maputo City
Council, Mozambique
- Mr. Luis Carvalho, Coordinator Civil Protection, Amadora City Council, Portugal
- City of Dakar (representative TBC)

Ms. Anamaria Vrabie, Director Cluj Innovation Fund

The session will be in English.

* Sessions held in East Agora will only be accessible for Smart City Expo pass holders. Please contact the Barcelona Resilience Week Secretariat to find out how you can access these sessions.

Plant-for-the-Planet, an organisation that aims to raise awareness amongst children and adults about the issues of climate change and global justice, is leading a series of intergenerational dialogues with city decision makers.

* Sessions held in Central or East Agora will only be accessible for Smart City Expo pass holders. Please contact the Barcelona Resilience Week Secretariatto find out how you can access these sessions.

Smart City Expo World Congress is committed to leveraging the implementation and follow-up of all global agendas at local and national level. The event aims to be the place to collectivize urban power, to increase the strength of cities, to identify business opportunities, to establish partnerships and contribute to enacting common policies. A place to share research, best practices and potential common solutions, achieved through effective collaboration.

More information and registration modalities at www.smartcityexpo.com

Resilience lies at the core of the humanitarian-development nexus, bridging two often disparate agendas. Ingraining resilience across the city and in the institutions that govern it reduces risks by increasing capacity. Addressing vulnerabilities in the city decreases fragility and mitigates impacts, hereby enhancing effective and forward-thinking response. This dialogue will explore the shared ground between resilience, humanitarian action and development.

Mr. Mohammed Abdalfatah (Al-Halabi), Director of International Cooperation, Municipality of Gaza Mr. Dan Lewis, West Coast International and Cardiff University Mr. Jorn Owre, Advisor, NORCAP/Norwegian Refugee Council Ms. Maggie Smith, Specialist on Resilient Housing Reconstruction

Mr. Havard Breivik, Coordinator of the Global Alliance for Urban Crises

The session will be in English.

* Sessions held in Central or East Agora will only be accessible for Smart City Expo pass holders. Please contact the Barcelona Resilience Week Secretariatto find out how you can access these sessions.

Governments, development and built environment stakeholders have increased knowledge to plan and operationalize technical assistance for housing reconstruction to meet the needs of communities affected by disasters and to foster sustainable improvements in housing construction. UN-Habitat and AXA Group are launching a Guidelines publication addressed to city decision makers on promoting resilient construction.

* Sessions held in Central or East Agora will only be accessible for Smart City Expo pass holders. Please contact the Barcelona Resilience Week Secretariatto find out how you can access these sessions

To achieve the extensive list of targets and goals set out for cities in global development frameworks such as the Agenda 2030, Sendai Framework, Paris Agreement and New Urban Agenda, city actors need be given the right tools, knowledge, resources, mandate and expertise for the job. Exchanging voices and experiences between local governments can help transform their capacity to influence, implement and sustain sustainable and resilient urban growth and flag shortcomings or gaps to be filled.

By invitation

The 2030 Agenda acknowledges the invaluable contribution of partnership in achieving its vision and mission, highlights the role of international organizations, the private sector, academia, civil society, and citizens. This dialogue will consider how partners from different sectors and at different scales can and have come together to build sustainable and resilient cities and explore the opportunities for scale-up.

After the Dialogue there will be a visit to the Control and electrical network management centre.This visit includes the central headquarters of Endesa, the eParking Office of Endesa’s Central Catalonia Division of Distribution (which includes 30 charging points for electric vehicles), and the Control Centre that manages Endesa’s high-, medium-and low-voltage power grid in Catalonia.

Mr. Alexey Golubev, Mayor of Sarov, Russia Mr. Aslihan Albostan, Research Analyst, UNDP International Center for Private Sector in Development Mr. Maria Jose Chesa, Head of External Relations, Barcelona Water Cycle, Barcelona City Council Mr Miguel Pardo, ENDESA

Ms. Christine Musisi, Director External Relations, UN-Habitat

The session will be in English.

As an optional activity, site visits are offered to participants of Barcelona Resilience Week as a unique opportunity to see first-hand successful resilience projects and solutions being implemented in Barcelona.

There are two routes available that include three site visits each. A shuttle bus will be provided; departing from Fira de Barcelona (see Venues) at 15:00h and returning to the departure point around 18:30h. Please note that there is a limited capacity of 15 people per bus. Prior confirmation is mandatory, please contact info@cityresilience.org to confirm your attendance. Find more information on the site visits below.

(No-cost activity)

ROUTE 1: SOCIAL RESILIENCE

The Emergency and Social Urgencies Centre of Barcelona (CUESB) is a permanent local service open 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. For Social Emergencies, it complements the municipal network of basic and specialized social services in the care of people and/or families who present a situation of urgency or high social risk.

For Social Emergencies, the aim is to provide immediate psychosocial attention to people who have been affected by: - Critical incidents (traffic accidents, suicide, unexpected death, etc.) when relatives are suffering emotional pain and a quick intervention is needed to avoid post-traumatic stress.
- Fires, explosions, floods, preventive evacuations, etc.
- Homeless people at risk because of extreme weather conditions

The professional team is composed of social workers, psychologists and qualified personnel, who are organized in shifts to give permanent attention to the citizens.

The telecare service is a free home-care service that focused on improving wellbeing, autonomy and security of the person and their family.

It is a permanent service operating 24 hours a day, 356 days a year. It is intended to help the elderly, disabled and / or dependent so that they can continue living at home safely and reduce the risk of isolation. From the Telecare Assistance Center, the team of professionals attends the user's consultation and activates, if necessary, the most appropriate resource for the situation: locate contact people (family, friends, etc.), move a mobile unit or activate emergency services (061, Firemen, ...).

Superblocks is the urban strategy that Barcelona City Council is implementing to tackle compact city challenges: lack of green spaces, high level of air-pollution and traffic noise, accident rates and sedentary lifestyle.

The Superblocks program establishes a new way of organising the city which reverses the current distribution of public areas amongst vehicles and people by defining street networks, providing different street typologies and introducing diverse facilities like resting places and space for citizens’ leisure.

In addition, this program aims at acquiring a more sustainable mobility, a chance to introduce measures to improve biodiversity and a complete involvement of citizens in the design.

ROUTE 2: RESILIENCE ON BASIC SERVICES

Barcelona was the first city in Spain to build a DHC system, in 2004, and actively promotes this type of energy supply, especially in new urban areas. Econoenergies Barcelona is a District Heating and Cooling (DHC) based on biomass and cold recovery from a liquefied natural gas (LNG) terminal. It illustrates the potential of DHC (and particularly District Cooling-DC-) in cities with warm weather, where district energy supply is less common than in Northern countries.

Ecoenergies Barcelona network is operated through a public-private partnership between Veolia Group (www.veolia.com/en) and the Barcelona City Council (30-year concession) and is gradually expanding in the city.

Rainwater retention tanks are large structures, normally buried in the city, where waste water (residual + rainwater) is stored during intense rain episodes, to reduce the flow of water below the reservoir, hereby avoiding that the sewers are overrun or that a large amount of waste water is released to the receiving environment by the overflowing. The detention tank located in the subsoil of Parc de Joan Miró has a total capacity of 55,000m3, equivalent to 22 Olympic swimming pools, and a depth of 17 meters.

The subsoil of Barcelona is rich in water resources, which led to the important industrial development of the late nineteenth century. However, its overexploitation (exceeded 60 hm3 / year) resulted in a significant drop in the phreatic water and saline intrusion. The Montjuïc distribution system works entirely by gravity.