Features

Cities Forward’s Kickoff Summit in Mexico City

On September 26-28, the Institute of the Americas (IOA), together with its partners, ICLEI, Resilient Cities Catalyst and the U.S. State Department co-convened the Cities Forward’s kickoff summit in Mexico City with the program’s city pairs from the U.S, Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC). Cities Forward is a collaborative partnership that aims to provide peer-to-peer exchange, capacity building and diplomatic engagement to support projects addressing critical sustainability-focused challenges in municipalities across LAC. 

In Mexico City, US and LAC city pairs (ranging from Baltimore/Cali, Colombia; Hoboken/Montego Bay, Jamaica and Merida/Austin-Travis County) began exploring ways to share knowledge and collaborate in addressing key sustainability priorities including responses to climate stresses (e.g. extreme weather events, sea level rise, biodiversity loss) and climate adaptation solutions including urban & green infrastructure and food systems; neighborhood redevelopment plans; and adaptation strategies for coastal areas and river corridors.

IOA partner, CAF-the Latin American Development Bank, hosted a reception and participated along with the Inter-American Development Bank in a panel discussion for City Forward LAC city officials on overcoming project implementation challenges and financing gaps. IOA’s team members participating in the Cities Forward’s Mexico City convening included Richard Kiy, Tania Miranda, Shane Christensen and Carlos Eduardo Correa. 

To learn more about Cities Forward visit the following link: https://iamericas.org/cities-forward-initiative/

Programs

Energy & sustainability

Brazil Energy & Sustainability Roundtable

Argentina Energy Roundtable

Brief: China’s Consumption Challenge – Why It’s Important for Latin America

Our Flagship Annual Event: XXXII La Jolla Energy Conference

ENVIRONMENT & CLIMATE CHANGE (EC2)

Storymap on Shipping Emissions and Water Pollution

Digital Transformation for Sustainability – A Latin American and Caribbean Journey

Unlocking Sustainable Finance: Green & Sustainable Taxonomies

In this brief, co-authored by IOA non-resident fellow Soffía Alarcón and EC2 director Tania Mirada, we explore a few featured taxonomies, including all of those in Latin America, as well as the region’s existing challenges, opportunities stemmed from this instrument, and what comes next.

Ecological Monitoring: 25 years of studying rocky reefs in the Gulf of California

This year marks the 25^th anniversary of the longest-running rocky reef monitoring program in the Gulf of California, Mexico. This annual research program, which has been coordinated by IOA’s Gulf of California Marine Program since 2008 and is one of our core activities, allows data to be generated and provides opportunities for hands-on field experience for students and young professionals. In September, a team of 18 scientists from five different institutions embarked on a month-long expedition to study marine and coastal ecosystems from Bahía de Los Ángeles, in the northern gulf, to Cabo San Lucas, on the southern tip of the peninsula.

With over 120 study sites in the itinerary, our partners from Scripps Institution of Oceanography of UCSD and the Centro para la Biodiversidad Marina y la Conservación will lead six research teams focusing on assessing blue carbon ecosystems, invertebrate and fish communities and pelagic and rare species. Upon their return, the GCMP will coordinate work sessions with participating researchers to analyze data and publish a report with findings related to biodiversity and reef health status.  We look forward to learning about the results from this expedition and sharing them with the world very soon, but in the meantime, you can explore and access the data generated so far through the GCMP’s dataMares platform.

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