“Connecting Actors for Sustainable Development in the Context of the United Nations 2030 Agenda” was the title of the conference organized in Barcelona on 10-11 November at the initiative of the Sant Pau Knowledge Centre. In the framework of this gathering, the two UN-Habitat programmes based in the city, the Global Water Operators’ Partnerships Alliance and the City Resilience Profiling Programme, co-organized a parallel session (one of five) and challenged participants to reflect on the importance of water and sanitation in urban resilience strategies, and consider the links between these strategies and the wider achievement of the 2030 goals. GWOPA Steering Committee member, AGBAR participated this session and set the scene for the discussion. 

Participants identified three key actions that they believed should be strengthened in this area and in our joint efforts towards global development: fostering more strategic and fruitful partnerships, promotion of more effective knowledge creation and exchange, and the adoption a transversal approach by all actors.

Conclusions from this and the other 4 parallel sessions were presented in plenary in order to identify synergies and next steps for local stakeholders looking to further contribute to the global agenda. The Sant Pau Knowledge Centre committed to present these outcomes in a detailed report and in a more synthetic format as an initial next step for participants to follow up on the dialogue.

Throughout the conference, the importance of building strong alliances, involving local governments and adopting a holistic approach was reiterated by many participants, including representatives from local and regional governments in Catalonia who welcomed the opportunity to engage with other actors through initiatives such as this conference.

Speaking on behalf of the two UN-Habitat offices in Barcelona, Dan Lewis, Chief of the Urban Risk Reduction Unit, praised the active participation of all those who attended the conference and commended the initiative of the Sant Pau Knowledge Centre in creating this space for dialogue.