CANDIDATURE OF THE CITY OF LYON FOR THE PRESIDENCY OF THE DECENTRALISED COOPERATION COMMISSION OF UNITED CITIES AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS

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1 CANDIDATURE OF THE CITY OF LYON FOR THE PRESIDENCY OF THE DECENTRALISED COOPERATION COMMISSION OF UNITED CITIES AND LOCAL GOVERNMENTS

2 In every region in the world, the north and the south, regional bodies are intensifying their exchanges and their commitment with regard to development aid. Alongside national governments, multilateral authorities and NGOs, local governments are joining forces to seek out the methods and means for successful local development in their areas, for improving the living conditions of their populations, for encouraging their participation, allowing as many people as possible to have access to essential local public services and thus to reduce poverty. The UCLG s decentralised cooperation commission should first and foremost ensure that all their efforts and successes are capitalised on, mutualised and promoted. Its role will also be to mobilise all the local authorities around their international organisation, its governing bodies and its general secretariat to have our contacts within government and multilateral organisations recognise their productive participation in achieving the Millennium Goals. We are convinced that local governments are the most effective level of public action in the fight against poverty by bringing together in synergy all the public and private actors concerned. The City and the Urban Community of Lyon, with their experience of working within networks of cities and with the support of the cooperation tools they have created, wish to serve the members and regional sections of UCLG to act and together to tackle the challenges of development and to consolidate our exchanges between local authorities. Gérard Collomb Mayor of Lyon, President of Greater Lyon GENERAL ORIENTATION OF THE DECENTRALISED COOPERATION AND CITY DIPLOMACY COMMISSIONS PROPOSED BY THE CITIES OF LYON AND THE HAGUE IN COORDINATION WITH THE GENERAL SECRETARIAT OF THE UCLG United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG) has a firm belief that local governments can and should play an important and specific role in international cooperation. In a stable environment, local governments with their know-how are very capable of contributing significantly to local development and local government capacity building through town twinning, exchange programs and technical assistance. In an environment of violent conflict and post-conflict, local government leadership is very able to mobilise the goodwill and energy of their civil societies and to contribute to peaceful dialogue and peaceful solutions. In order to promote, support, strengthen and get full recognition for this role of its membership in international cooperation, UCLG will set up two political commissions which will develop UCLG s active policies in these fields. The main objective of the Decentralised Cooperation Commission is to advocate, develop, support and obtain recognition for decentralised cooperation as a very direct and cost-effective medium for development cooperation, bringing together peers in partnership based on appropriate professional expertise, innovation and mutual benefit. The main objective of the City Diplomacy Commission is to create a place where local governments confronted with conflict and war can come with their problems and where initiatives can be taken with regard to local governments in difficulty. These two commissions will work within a common framework of UCLG s policy to promote the role of local governments in international cooperation. Though they have clearly distinct fields of work and objectives, the two commissions will try to create as much synergy as possible.

3 DECENTRALISED COOPERATION In an ever-changing international context, States, multilateral institutions and NGOs are no longer the only actors in development aid. From the old twinning concepts through to today s town-to-town cooperation programmes or those between associations of local authorities, via participation in multilateral programmes, regional bodies in the north and south have become essential actors in international relations. By means of decentralised cooperation, local governments are implementing real programmes of cooperation. Their objectives are to contribute to development, to reinforce the efficiency of their management and to provide local public services to help improve the living conditions of populations and to intensify exchanges and dialogue between nations. THE ROLE OF THE COMMISSION 1. A SPACE for exchanges and for reinforcing solidarity between local authorities all around the globe 2. A TOOL for acting together to boost development which is both sound and sustainable for common destinations or subject areas 3. A VOICE for ensuring recognition of the place and increasing role of local authorities by national governments and multilateral authorities. THE ORGANISATION OF THE COMMISSION: Presidency and steering committee of the commission: President and member of the executive committee of UCLG : Gérard Collomb, Mayor of Lyon, President of Greater Lyon 4 Vice-Presidents and members of the executive committee of UCLG General secretariat of the commission: The function of general secretariat of the commission is provided by a representative of the Department for International Relations of Lyon / Greater Lyon in close collaboration with the general secretariat of UCLG. It mobilises the expertise and collaboration of the 20 members of this department. Composition of the commission: The individual members or associations of local authorities registered with the international secretariat of UCLG.

4 WORKING PLAN FOR 2005 / 2008 A SPACE FOR EXCHANGES AND FOR REINFORCING SOLIDARITY 1. Illustrating the place and the role of local authorities in development aid actions via an inventory by region: the legal context, the actors, the financial backers, campaigns serving as examples, the means and expertise mobilised 2. Capitalising on experience, identifying and mutualising the good practices of the regional sections already committed in this regard: Europe, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America. 3. Ensuring that information is circulated among the members of the commission; updating the part of the UCLG s website dedicated to decentralised cooperation. 4. Organising meetings between the members of the commission periodically, in particular at the time of the UCLG s executive committee meetings A TOOL FOR ACTING TOGETHER 1. Running innovative pilot actions to renew and improve decentralised cooperation practices. 2. Providing support for putting in place decentralised cooperation between local authorities in other regional sections interested in this method of cooperation 3. Developing a common methodology for local governments to respond to disaster situations and to reconstruct situations in the aftermath of disasters. A VOICE FOR ENSURING RECOGNITION OF THE PLACE AND ROLE OF LOCAL AUTHORITIES Providing the support of the commission to the presidency and the general secretariat of the UCLG to: 1. promote and further the direct participation of local authorities in the definition and implementation of bilateral or multilateral cooperation programmes in the field of local development. 2. contribute to the recognition and active participation of local authorities in international conferences dealing with development aid issues.

5 LYON: THE PRACTICE OF RESOLUTELY MULTILATERAL DECENTRALISED COOPERATION Traditionally anchored in bilateral cooperation actions, the policy pursued by the conurbation of Lyon has changed enormously over the past three years due to the creation of tools and modes of action aiming to bring together and promote synergies between a larger number of local, national, international, public and private actors. 1. ACTIVE PARTICIPATION IN NATIONAL AND INTERNATIONAL NETWORKS OF LOCAL AUTHORITIES Over and above its active participation in the development of UCLG, Lyon is involved in many national and international bodies for solidarity and cooperation. Our city is a member of the governing bodies of Cités Unies France, in which it is also chairman of the Lebanon group, and of the French Association of the Council of Communes and Regions of Europe. It is vicepresident of Eurocités which brings together 120 European cities, and chairs its economic development commission: it is part of Citynet, which boasts a membership of 80 medium-sized and large Asian towns and cities. As such, Lyon has become an important interface between cities in Europe and in Asia. This will be reflected in practice through to 2007 by the running of a European programme "Proact" intended to create the conditions for a network of Euro-Asian cities which provides and seeks financing from international financial backers for decentralised cooperation projects. 2. COOPERATION ACTIONS WITH A DOZEN CITIES A dozen cities on 3 continents are in a relationship of cooperation with Lyon. This cooperation occurs in the most diverse areas regarding the management of basic local public services, heritage and culture, training for human resources and local council representatives etc. These actions often form the subject of searches for finance and partnership with the Greater Lyon Urban Development Agency, the French Ministry for Foreign Affairs, the French Development Agency, private sector businesses, the European Union, the Agencies of the United Nations (UNDP, UNITAR) and the World Bank. Ougadougou (Burkina Faso) Bamako (Mali) Porto-Novo (Benin) Beirut (Lebanon) Algiers (Algeria) Oran (Algeria) Rabat (Morocco) Yerevan (Armenia) Aleppo (Syria) Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) Ho Chi Minh City (Vietnam) Balti (Moldova) Projects are at preparatory stage in other cities in North Africa, in the Middle East, Asia

6 3. 4. Information : Jacques Petriment, Deputy Director Department of international relations City Hall 1 Place de la comédie Lyon cedex 01 Telephone : Fax : jacques.petriment@mairie-lyon.fr TRAINING STRUCTURES National university of sustainable development, the centre of which is at the Claude Bernard University, Lyon, in the context of a UNESCO chair. This organisation brings together various resource centres for research and higher education throughout the world. It is intended to allow exchanges of sustainable development practices, to capitalise on the experience of local governments and to implement cooperation in the field of the environment. The training and resource centre for urban professions of Ouagadougou in Burkina Faso (CFCMUO). This centre offers African towns and cities programmes for the exchange of experience on urban management topics on the basis of their innovative initiatives. This action, launched in 2003, has received support from the African Municipal Development Programme (MDP), the international association of French-speaking Mayors (AIMF), Towns and Cities United against poverty and also private businesses. UNITAR dubbed this centre the International Training Centre for the local actors of Ouagadougou (CIFAL Ouagadougou). CIFAL Centre of Lyon, in the field of public health. Its objective is principally to put in place partnerships and training, to capitalise on experience in the field of major pandemics (fight against AIDS, malaria and research into the eradication of the pandemics still present in the world such as that of tuberculosis). It receives support from the United Nations (UNITAR) and the World Health Organisation (WHO) which has an office in Lyon. THE TOOLS OF DECENTRALISED COOPERATION The conurbation of Lyon has equipped itself with a number of resources: Cities United against Poverty: created in 2001 by the cities of Geneva, Bamako and Lyon, this international association which wishes to see other towns and cities in the north and south swell its ranks, aims to mutualise municipal expertise in essential public services and the fields of health, welfare, urban renewal etc. Numerical solidarity Fund: created by Lyon and Geneva in 2003, the Numerical solidarity Fund is intended to collect finance to reduce the disparity between rich and poor towns and cities in the field of access to information. This Fund, supported by numerous states, cities and towns throughout the world, as well as public bodies and private businesses, has established a project management body: the World Agency for numerical solidarity, based in Lyon. Solidarity and sustainable development Fund for access to water, Grand Lyon / Veolia environnement: created in Lyon in 2003, this body finances, in the context of a public / private partnership, initiatives for access to water and sanitation improvement in towns and cities with potable water shortages. This initiative is jointly and equally financed by Veolia environnement and the Lyons regional body. Today, this Fund is at work in Morocco, Madagascar, Burkina Faso and Moldavia.. Asia / Lyon solidarity Collective: NGOs with international solidarity, private businesses and Grand Lyon are combining their efforts to support reconstruction projects in southeast Asia following the tsunami of 26 December This partnership is also based on cooperation with the city of Yokohama and the Citynet association. Projects are progressing in the fields of access to water and gradual re-urbanisation of the stricken zones principally in the south of Sri Lanka and the region of Banda Aceh in Indonesia.