Summary

The subnational government of the Basque Country (Spain) presented the first Monitoring Report of the Basque Country Urban Agenda "Bultzatu 2050" at the EuskalHiria 2022 congress (November 28-29, 2022, Bilbao), highlighting, among others, significant progress in promoting the right to housing and basic facilities, as well as in creating innovative, sustainable and environmentally resilient cities in terms of diversity and inclusion. The Report also identified that there are still steps to be taken in terms of energy use and emissions from the transport sector, the protection of ecosystems, the birth rate, R&D investment and an increase in the number of female researchers. The "Bultzatu 2050" Agenda, adopted in 2019, is a document that frames the sustainable development of the Basque Country in terms of environment, housing, energy, economy and employment, mobility and transport, digital transition, quality of life and health, as well as social inclusion, for the next 30 years. This first Report recounts in a didactic and communicative way the progress made since the adoption of the Urban Agenda until today, collecting the work done by various socio-economic actors in the "Urban Agenda Working Group of the Multi-Agency Forum for the implementation of the 2030 Agenda in the Basque Country". It especially illustrates concrete progress in neighborhood regeneration projects, social inclusion through employment opportunities for the most vulnerable people, integration of the migrant population, citizen and institutional responses to the energy and climate emergency, municipal action to implement gender equality or progress towards open and participatory local governance. On the other hand, it establishes a proposal for a framework of indicators adapted to the reality of the Basque Country that allows measuring progress based on existing data and, as far as possible, on the clear objectives established by various Action Plans in the Basque Country. Finally, it includes a series of external contributions from various sectors that provide their views on sustainable urban development from a Basque perspective. "It is, in any case, a first monitoring report that establishes a starting point and that will have an annual replica in which the steps taken are assessed from a critical and constructive perspective" said Iñaki Arriola, Minister of Environment, Territorial Planning and Housing of the subnational government of the Basque Country (Spain), adding that "the Urban Agenda of the Basque Country must be inserted coherently in the broad framework of policies that the Basque Government has promoted and is promoting to achieve a sustainable, prosperous and cohesive region. In this sense, the integration of the 'Bultzatu 2050' Agenda and the Basque Strategy for the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals, meant an important milestone, since - as seen in the Report - making cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable (as indicated in SDG 11) is an essential element in the localization process of the global Agenda." The presentation of the Report took place within the framework of the XXI edition of the EuskalHiria Congress, organized by the Basque Government with the support of UN-Habitat on November 28-29, 2022 in Bilbao, which brought together a hundred specialists from the international, national, regional and local levels, from institutions such as UN-Habitat, United Nations Research Institute for Social Development (UNRISD), the European Commission, United Cities and Local Governments (UCLG), as well as representatives of the Spanish Ministry for Ecological Transition and Demographic Challenge, the subnational government of the Basque Country and other autonomous communities, regional governments, city councils, among many other actors, on the design of sustainable and inclusive cities to leave no one behind. The Congress addressed the SDGs and the New Social Contract around cities and territories, reflecting on the relationship between inequality and the inhabited space that manifests itself in different sectors and scales, with a cross-cutting nature, and with the New Urban Agenda as a tool to manage opportunities.