Facilitating development through discussion

CRIC  Project facilitates the tools of development to help ten pilot cities transition towards climate-resilient and inclusive growth. The tools developed for the cities are adjusted to meet their needs and climate change problems, as elaborated in the Urban Analysis Reports (2020). The recommendations from these reports were discussed with stakeholders who are part of the City Working Group to decide on the priority sector based on the agenda and problems they need to overcome. The tools developed are related to the early warning system, waste management and water & sanitation. CRIC prioritises social inclusion and stakeholders’ involvement, starting from the city to national levels, in the tools development processes.

The FGDs are organised to extract information on primary issues, challenges and potential solutions from the tool’s development. The tools developed should be well-targeted and concretely address existing problems by considering the different characteristics of each city. The results of these discussions will be used as a primary reference for developing the framework and action plan. The tools development process will take place throughout 2021 by involving experts from Europe and local partners. The tools are then tested, evaluated and implemented in the pilot cities from 2022 to 2024.

Purposes

The FGD aimed to collect constructive inputs from participants and build a consensus on the scope of tools to be developed. The FGD’s purposes were to:

1. Facilitate policy dialogue and knowledge exchange between Indonesian policymakers at the Ministry of Environment and Forestry, local governments of ten (10) pilot cities, UCLG ASPAC, CRIC Project, APEKSI and other relevant stakeholders in the strategic sectors;
2. Engage with experts and key actors from Indonesian, European and South Asian respective agencies and bring their expertise to developing climate change tools;
3. Propose  tool recommendations from the European experts to reach an agreement on the tools and the scope;
4. Solicit ideas and input from all involved as the basis for CRIC to strengthen its programme delivery and intervention.

Methodology

FGD method was selected to gain clarity and reach an agreement among diverse participants (cities, national governments and experts) on tools developed in the waste management, early warning system (EWS) and water and sanitation sectors. The selection of these three sectors referred to the Urban Analysis Reports, input and recommendation matrix document and cities’ development planning documents.

Before the FGD, a technical meeting with cities was conducted to help cities prepare presentation materials based on the agreed template. The template guided cities to include critical information about the tools expected by cities. The key information to be presented were:

1. Goal that cities want to achieve through the tool adoption;
2. The scope of tools;
3. Modality in cities;
4. Tool gaps in the priority sector;
5. Proposed location where the tools will be tested and adopted;
6. Potential programme/policy.

The FGD was divided into three main parts: presentation from the cities, tools presentation from experts and discussion. The moderator facilitated the sessions in a bid to obtain responses from the participants. The moderator guided the discussion process by allowing all stakeholders to express their opinions and insights.  During the discussion, the moderator verified the findings and paraphrased the responses from the participants. The meeting was directed to bring forward potential solutions to tackle cities’ urban challenges in the water and sanitation, EWS and waste management sectors. The FGD was recorded, and the results were then analysed and utilised as a reference to design the framework of tools development.