The Province of Barcelona is offering nine different economic, technical and material tools to municipalities in the region in order to support and strengthen their capacity to undertake international development cooperation during 2023.
The goal of this catalogue of services is to reinforce the unique role and added value of local administrations in the planning and implementation of development cooperation policy. It includes €1.411.214 in financing to local development cooperation actions (with a special emphasis on Education for Global Citizenship), technical support for policy planning and evaluation, as well as material resources such as exhibitions.
As an intermediary level of government in Spain, municipal capacity building is one of the core missions of the Province of Barcelona. Development cooperation can be a particularly difficult policy area for municipalities to engage in, especially those with smaller populations that have limited resources and international relations experience. The role of the Province’s Development Cooperation Office is to encourage local governments to become active in this policy area and to strengthen and build on existing public policy. The Province of Barcelona allocates 0.7% of its total budget to international development and decentralized cooperation, in line with international targets.
This year, a special effort has been made to adapt the catalogue of services to local needs, and to simplify the application process. All the tools on offer are aligned with the 2030 Agenda and with the Province of Barcelona’s goals of empowering citizens and local governments to be agents of transformation for sustainable global development.