UNESCO promotes Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) through the Global Action Programme (GAP), the official follow-up to the UN Decade for ESD. It is against this background that key partners, the UNESCO Global Network of Learning Cities with its secretariat at the UNESCO Institute for Lifelong Learning (UIL) and the City of Hamburg, organised the Regional workshop for Europe and North America, in collaboration with UNESCO Education sector and UNESCO Regional Bureau for Science and Culture in Europe, Venice (Italy).

One of the five Priority Action Areas of the GAP focuses on mainstreaming ESD at local level.  Ensuring efficient GAP implementation to enhance and integrate ESD at local level means mobilizing local municipalities and communities, ensuring they have sufficient capacities in ESD, strengthening learning opportunities for citizens in various settings, and also promoting collaboration among relevant local stakeholders in different sectors.

The key outcomes of the Workshop included a better awareness on integrating ESD at local level, supporting the implementation of the SDGs through ESD, and building ESD capacities in cities and municipalities. Priority areas for ESD activities were identified, in particular linking ESD with the different SDGs and their implementation at city level. Educational scenario exercises for participatory sustainability planning at local level were introduced. The workshop permitted to present ESD  practices  and  policies  in  urban  contexts  that  could  be  shared  and  replicated. Finally, ESD Policy & Action Pact were promoted.

Partnerships will be explored between the cities having similar profile and challenges, for example between the cities of Hamburg and Venice (including the potential of their universities), encouraging expansion of multi-stakeholder ESD platforms, and reinforcing exchange of good practices through UNESCO.