UNESCAP and UN-Habitat hosted the ‘2018 Regional Project Inception and Co-learning Workshop’, with the purpose of strengthening the capacities of local governments and urban stakeholders for project on localizing the SDGs for sustainable urban resource management (SURM). It was held on 2-7 December at Bangkok, Thailand.

The workshop was attended by participants from the select pilot cities to run a project on the above-mentioned theme, as well as other UN agencies, and other stakeholders of target countries and groups such as developing countries from the Asia-Pacific region.

CityNet was invited to be the main promoter of the workshop through the Urban SDG Knowledge Platform as a partner organization.

The workshop was organized in order to assist urban stakeholders in adapting their local development plans and in implementing linked activities in line with SDG 6 (clear water and sanitation), SDG 7 (affordable and clean energy), SDG 11 (sustainable cities and communities), SDG 12 (responsible consumption and production), and SDG 17 (partnership for the goals) in a way to achieve the success of three-year project.

The workshop sessions included; inception of project with overview and pilot cities, introduction to localizing the SDGs and participatory and inclusive urban governance as linked to SURM, use of data for strengthening evidence-based policy, and applying systems thinking approaches for more holistic local plans. During the workshop, CityNet presented the Urban SDG Knowledge platform as a joint collaboration with Seoul Metropolitan Government and UNESCAP and invited all participants to be actively engaged with the platform as an important source of knowledge for the SDG implementation.