European municipalities are ready to CONNECT!

Municipal experts from the Sandgerdi (Iceland) and Almere (The Netherlands) gathered in Brussels on 31 March for the CONNECT kick-off meeting. City representatives learned more about the CONNECT mechanism and participated in an intercultural and inter-municipal exchange training.

Preparation for the first knowledge exchanges

The two municipalities have signed up for the first knowledge exchanges facilitated by CONNECT, which will take place in May this year. Almere will be visiting Agona West, Ghana, and assist them in defining priorities and exploring opportunities for financing in the field of sanitation.

Sandgerdi, a new player in the field of international municipal cooperation, will fly to the Pursat municipality in Cambodia. There, the main topic of discussion is Pursat’s Human Resources Policy and how this can be improved.

The Kick-Off meeting served as a first face-to-face meeting with the municipalities, in which they could ask all their questions and further develop their Terms of References (taking into account the requests from the partner municipalities and the framework and guidelines of CONNECT).

Sander Maathuis provided a training, full of tips, advice and concrete tools on how to establish fruitful intercultural exchange, which were perceived as very useful for the upcoming missions.

CONNECT

PLATFORMA and VNG International are currently piloting the CONNECT mechanism. In the next months, European municipalities will share their experiences with and learn from municipalities in Cambodia, Uganda, Ghana and Colombia.

The CONNECT team has been very busy with the identification of supply and demand, as well as with the drafting of formats, contracts etc. More information on the first knowledge exchanges and relevant lessons learned will be shared online shortly. So, let’s CONNECT!