Academic meetings lead to strong strategic tools

The four days in Yogyakarta also included a two-day research conference with a clear focus on Asia and democratic development at a local level, primarily in South and South East Asia. A key feature of the discussion with the alumni was how ICLD can help strengthen capacity and identify capacity shortfalls at the local level.
An MP project was presented at the meeting, namely the collaboration between Yogyakarta and Västerbotten County Council under the heading of, ”Dengue early warning system and risk communication”.

The aim of the ongoing project is to work together to identify methods of predicting when major outbreaks of the disease can be expected and to improve communication on how diseases spread. The project focuses heavily on increased transparency at local level.

The meeting also saw a presentation of the waste management MP project between Timrå and South Tangerang. This project is a good example of successful collaboration within ICLD, with clear synergies between the ITP and MP units.
“Several of the Indonesian alumni who are key players in MP projects have previous experience of ICLD’s training programmes. This has ensured in-depth familiarity with the way ICLD works and enabled them to exploit the knowledge they have gained from ITP in the context of their MP collaborations,” says Erik Nilsson at ICLD’s Knowledge Centre.

The Advisory Group session also included a visit to an informal settlement on the outskirts of Yogyakarta, Ngampilan. The aim of the visit was to further highlight the challenges faced by the local population in their day-to-day lives.
“The visit to Ngampilan gave both the members of the Advisory Group and those of us from the Knowledge Centre an increased understanding of the local conditions for development. Setting aside time for this sort of visit during the meetings brought a different perspective to the academic discussions with the group and helps create even stronger strategic input to the group from ICLD’s various programmes,” says Björn Möller from ICLD’s Knowledge Centre.