Greetings!
It’s been a busy year for Ecocity Builders. Program wise, we launched the EcoCitizen World Map Project with pilots now starting in Morocco, Egypt and Colombia. We’re excited about the potential for this project to replicate and grow to support other cities and citizens around the world. TheInternational Ecocity Framework and Standards Initiativeevolved and strengthened with focused work on all aspects of defining and measuring what we mean by “ecocity”.
We partnered with Consensus Institute and Graphical Memesto help develop and test a next generation urban metabolism visualization software called “City Metaflow”. We spent time in Bhutan thinking through a country-wide ecocity program to complement their Gross National Happiness platform.Ecocity World Summit 2013 convened in Nantes, France, and was the largest ecocity conference yet in the series.
Our new local co-working project, Ecocity CoLab, opened in downtown Oakland in a remodeled and light filled studio space. Our Board of Directors met for a retreat at Arcosanti Arizona where we discussed the evolution of the organization and planned for our future growth and impact. We joined UN Habitat’s World Urban Campaign and met with the UN Environment Program to discuss how we could cross connect with their Global Initiative for Resource Efficient Cities.
With the guidance of the International Ecocity Conference Relay Committee, we selected the city of Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates, facilitated by the Environment Agency of Abu Dhabi, as host for the 2015 Ecocity World Summit.
I’d like to take this opportunity to sincerely thank all of our partners, local and international, our members, staff, advisors, sponsors, funders and interns for their support and guidance in 2013. We are truly privileged to work with such knowledgeable and talented people. And to our friends and members – thank you for being part of our community. Our newsletter is received monthly by well over 13,000 active subscribers around the world. Thank you all for your individual and collective good work out there in the world!
As 2013 closes and 2014 approaches, I encourage you to please renew your membership to Ecocity Builders or become a member if you are not already or make a donationto support our work! You contribution, large or small, helps keep our organization up and running as we do our very best to help usher in the Ecozoic Era.
Happy Holidays!