FCM

In 2017, the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) conducted a series of video interviews with Canadian and international partners to discuss local change initiatives they have implemented in their community.

One of the important challenges FCM faces when working in fragile states is developing a shared understanding with national and local partners of what a functioning local government might look like. This not only requires understanding the aspirations and existing requirements of the national government with respect to decentralization and deconcentration –which often lacks in concrete guidance and leaves much to interpretation.

Municipalities are the level of government closest to people, and every municipality is unique. As such, there are many critical paths that can be followed to advance gender equality. It is at the local level that coherent policies and programs can be developed to address the multiple global challenges affecting all women and men. In many ways, local governments can be leaders and act as a model for gender equality and the empowerment of women to build stronger communities and a stronger world.

What kind of impact do our local government development cooperation projects have in the long run? 

Too often project managers do not have the opportunity to track progress in partner countries once development cooperation programmes come to an end. Mr. Roger Maclsaac, a former technical team leader from the Town of Amherst, Canada, had the chance to revisit his former project partners in the City of Escalante, Philippines.

In 2016, FCM continues to be active in over 25 countries around the world. Most recently, FCM published the latest edition of the FCMI Exchange which is FCM International’s knowledge sharing tool.

In the next few weeks, the Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) is organising several webinars and invites CIB members to attend and collaborate.

The webinars showcase FCM programmes and projects that are concerned with development cooperation abroad. Moreover, the webinars contain good practices that emerge from FCM’s experience, as well as an exchange of ideas both within Canada and between Canadian partners and foreign partners.

The Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) has found a key to catalyze innovation at the local level: the best way to encourage innovation is to ‘de-risk’ it.

A local response for the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals

The Federation of Canadian Municipalities (FCM) has launched a new five-year program, “Sustainable and Inclusive Communities in Latin America” (CISAL, 2015-2019, $20 million), funded by the Canadian government’s department of Foreign Affairs, Trade and Development. The objective of CISAL is to strengthen local governments in Colombia and Peru in their management of the impacts and benefits from mining development, as well as to train them to play a leading role in building more sustainable, resilient and inclusive communities.