Àrea Metropolitana de Barcelona

A focused and effective action articulated about the added value of the AMB.

17. In a context determined by the decline of the economic resources and in the context of the recommendations of the best international practices, this public policy has to make an effort to concentrate personal, technical and economic resources for the development cooperation in those sectoral and geographical priorities that are more aligned with: the needs arising from the pressure coming from the accelerated process of urbanization in the counterpart realities of the partner countries, on the one hand, and the areas of expertise and the capabilities existing in the different metropolitan actors on the other. In this sense, geographical and sectoral priorities of the Master Plan focus on what could be defined as the added value of the AMB as a cooperation agent and its municipalist and metropolitan nature.

18. As follows from the MAP, it is necessary to understand the metropolis as a network of towns and cities, territorially vertebrate, socially cohesive and environmentally sustainable, in a space shared for the welfare, the coexistence, the equality of opportunities, the respect of the human rights and the peace. The metropolis understood as a city of cities, which maintains and enhances its specific management model based on the respect of the identities of the different municipalities that take part in it, which optimizes the common goals and strategies, and provides an integrated and efficient management of the services. This will, expressed in the MAP, perfectly aligns with the needs of sustainable human development derived from the processes of urbanization that take place in the partner countries.

19. In addition, the development cooperation model of the AMB highlights the value of the municipalism and proximity public governance as a way to address more closely, efficiently and transparently the needs of the citizenship. In this sense, this policy focuses its activities in strengthening the municipalities and local governments, both in regard to its institutional strengthening, and the promotion of the participation of the citizens and the civil society in the definition of the public policies and the local democratic governance. The corollary of this work of municipal strengthening in the metropolitan reality of Barcelona is reinforced with the important task of sensitization and citizenship awareness developed, on the one hand, by civil society entities with their involvement in neighborhoods, schools, etc., and on the other hand, by the municipalities in the field of the Education for the Development, since it is the level of government that is closest to the people and the one with a longer tradition of work in the territory.

20. Being consistent with the MAP and taking as a starting point the municipalist and metropolitan vocation expressed in the MAP, as well as in the areas in which the AMB shows a sectoral experience, without neglecting the values defined in the Catalan Law of Cooperation, this Master Plan defines a series of sectoral priorities directly linked to the above-defined mission. These priorities are organized around four Strategic Objectives of Development Cooperation (SODC), extended, in turn, in its Specific Objectives (SO).

Sectoral priorities

• SODC 1. Promoting the respect and the realization of economic, social and cultural rights in urban conurbations and metropolitan regions.
  SO 1.1. Promoting the right to drinking water and the universal access to water and contributing to the improvement of the integrated management of the water cycle, the protection of water resources, the rational use, the improvement of the feedback systems, the supply and distribution of drinking water, the sanitation and the wastewater management.
  
  SO 1.2. Promoting the right to the housing in sustainable urban settlements, characterized by the access to a decent housing in an environment defined by the existence of adequate public spaces, services and infrastructures.
  
  SO 1.3. Promoting social cohesion and territorial construction by planning and creating public spaces that contribute to the welfare of the people, as well as their cultural rights and ecosystems.
• SODC 2. Promoting sustainable local development in urban conurbations and metropolitan regions.
  SO 2.1. Accompanying local strategic planning processes, which must be inclusive and participatory, and involve different local actors, especially those traditionally excluded, in decision-making.
  
  SO 2.2. Promoting the environmental sustainability by promoting local sustainable models, Agendas 21, the promotion of renewable energies, the mainstreaming sustainability in the local strategic planning and the environmental education.
  
  SO 2.3. Contributing to the improvement of the management and treatment of waste, with a special emphasis on the selective collection of waste services and its logistics management, its prevention and its minimization.
  
  SO 2.4. Contributing to the planning of urban mobility and the management of public transport in the urbanization processes, to ensure the safety, sustainability and rational use of transport, especially the public transport.
• SODC 3. Promoting local and metropolitan democratic governance and encouraging the participation and the agenda of governments and local authorities in international discussion forums.
  SO 3.1. Improving institutional and management capacities of the local governments of the urban conurbations and metropolitan regions, and promoting the participation of different local actors in the definition of local policies.
  
  SO 3.2. Improving the institutional and management capacities of metropolitan regions by means of the support and institutional strengthening of metropolitan governments that can reinforce the cooperative work between municipalities and the pooled management of services.
  
  SO 3.3. Promoting the participation of local governments in international discussion spaces and international networks, and promoting the agenda of the local development of cities and metropolis in the definition of the international agenda of the development.
  
  SO 3.4. Promoting the exchange of best practices, the knowledge and the research in challenges of sustainable human development in urban conurbations and metropolitan regions.
• SODC 4. Promoting the Education for Development (EfD) in the municipal space and the Metropolitan Area of Barcelona.
  SO 4.1. Improving knowledge and sensitization on challenges of sustainable human development arising from accelerated urbanization processes in urban conurbations and metropolitan regions.
  
  SO 4.2. Supporting the metropolitan municipalities by promoting an informed, committed and united citizenship through actions of Education for the Development.
  
  SO 4.3. Supporting civil society in tasks of education, sensitization and political advocacy in the metropolitan area, about the causes that can provoke of situations of inequality, poverty and exclusion for lack of peace, justice, equality and fairness in the relationships among people, communities, cultures, nations and states.
  
  SO 4.4. Working more deeply in the possibilities of EfD as a tool to improve transparency and accountability to the citizenship, and broadcasting successful experiences of development cooperation and its social transformation capacity.

Geographical priorities

21. As for the geographical priorities, alignment with the principles of efficiency and quality of the help, along with the need to Promoting a coordinated and complementary action with all the national and international cooperation actors, requires the concentration of resources and the identification of a geographical specificity for the cooperation model of the AMB. In this sense, the added value of the cooperation model of the AMB lies in the partnership that can be established with the counterpart southern realities. Thus, this plan prioritizes cooperation actions with metropolitan and urban conurbations that must face the challenges derived from regional, environmental, economic and social imbalances associated with fast urbanization processes, from the experience kept by the AMB in the jointly management of services at the abovementioned sectoral areas.

22. Consistently, the main focus of the geographical priorities in the cooperation model of the AMB is local, that is to say, urban habitats and, more specifically, urban conurbations and metropolitan regions. The main efforts of this public policy will be used in the dialogue with counterpart realities which can establish a cooperative relationship around shared problems. This does not prevents urban and metropolitan centers to be supplemented with national, regional or global actions, especially through networks, which contribute to the achievement of the strategic objectives defined by this plan, in areas such as Education for Development or the promotion of research and best practices on sustainable human development challenges in urban habitats urban conurbations and metropolitan regions.

23. As for the priority regions, this plan takes as reference the geographic priorities defined in the Cooperation Act, the Master Plan of the Government of Catalonia (Generalitat de Catalunya) and the MAP, and prioritizes those areas where meet the development needs arising from the urbanization processes, with the opportunities set for strategic alliances in terms of development, and either the settled or the potential capacities of all the metropolitan development cooperation agents. The intersection of these three parameters results in the prioritization of three regions: Mediterranean, Western Africa, Central America and the Caribbean.

24. Regarding the criteria for selecting urban conurbations and metropolitan areas with which start cooperation actions both the criteria of sustainable human development needs and the performance criteria of the AMB cooperation shall be taken into account. In this regard, among the different regions where it is relevant to cooperate, the cooperation of the AMB should focus its efforts on those conurbations which dispose of local opportunities and of its own capacities so as to make an effective cooperation with the added value of the metropolitan model. Thus, the selection criteria that will have to take into account are, among others:

1. The rates of human development, poverty and inequalities in the partner countries and/or regions.
2. Experience, institutional linkages and solidarity accumulated by the metropolitan actors.
3. Institutional capacities and commitment to the development of the Southern partners.
4. The capabilities, degree of organization and experience of civil society in the Southern partners.

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