Focused on strengthening urban resiliency, the CityLinks Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Cities Climate Change Partnership program has paired Chiang Rai, Thailand, with Cambridge, Massachusetts, and Legazpi City, Philippines, with Fort Lauderdale, Florida, to develop climate change adaptation strategies. These partnerships will create peer-to-peer learning opportunities among ASEAN and U.S. cities through interactive training, knowledge exchange conferences, exchange trips, and virtual advice from climate specialists about developing climate-resilient approaches.

In August 2013, forty Asian city officials from eight different cities gathered in Jakarta, Indonesia, for the CityLinks Climate Leadership Academy (CLA), an event co-hosted with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Secretariat. The workshop featured presentations and discussions about managing the social, political, environmental, and financial risks of climate change. During the CLA, cities identified actions that they would take to address climate change at the local level. After the successful completion of this workshop, CityLinks began to follow up with the participants to select two cities to partner with two American cities in a city-to-city exchange partnership. As a result of the progress accomplished toward their action plans, Legazpi City, Philippines, and Chiang Rai, Thailand, were chosen.

Meanwhile, CityLinks searched for U.S. cities with strong climate adaptation qualifications to participate in the same city-to-city partnership. After carefully reviewing applications from a number of municipalities, the team selected Fort Lauderdale, Florida, and Cambridge, Massachusetts. These cities were selected based on the quality of their applications, their enthusiasm in participation, as well as their similarities to selected ASEAN cities in topography, climate and infrastructure risks, and perceived compatibility.

Over the next six months, these cities will work together to develop projects that Chiang Rai and Legazpi City can begin implementing to increase their adaptive capacity to climate change. Potential projects may involve land use planning, scenario mapping, downscaling climate data, storm water management, and building codes. The CityLinks team will travel to Chiang Rai and Legazpi City this spring to further assess the climate-related needs of these communities. Later this summer, two representatives from the Asian cities will travel to their U.S. partner cities, and in return, U.S. city officials will visit Chiang Rai and Legazpi City in the fall of 2014.

CityLinks is a program funded by the United States Agency for International Development designed to address the global challenges of climate change, food security, and access to water and sanitation. To learn more about CityLinks, visit the website and the Notes from CityLinks blog, follow us on Twitter at @ICMACityLinks, and join the climate change discussion in the Climate Preparedness, Adaptation, and Resilience group on the Knowledge Network. Visit ICMA International’s site for additional information on ICMA’s other global projects.