CITIES FORUM worked as technical coordinator of the development cooperation project proposal “ADN Urbano Quito” for the call “Local Authorities: Partnerships for sustainable cities 2020” promoted by the European Commission’s International Cooperation and Development program.

ADN Urbano Quito was conceived as a project for the productive and social reactivation of vulnerable neighborhoods through the new governance and sustainable and integrated development with a budget of 3.4 million dollars.

The objectives of the project include:

• Improve the resilience and greening of the vulnerable neighborhoods of Quito (especially those that are most affected by the crisis generated by COVID-19) through the reinforcement of urban governance and innovation and the implementation of social inclusion actions and productive reactivation.
• Strengthen multilevel governance mechanisms (at the national, regional and urban / local scale) and the capacities of Quito’s officials and the network of local actors to support sustainable urban planning policies and programs in accordance with to the experiences of the city of Murcia is Spain.
• Improve the processes of social inclusion and economic-productive reactivation, the transition towards a sustainable and ecological urban development that allow to improve the economic conditions, citizen security and nutrition of the families of the target neighborhoods.

Some of the the activities planned were:

1. Definition of the methodology that allows the selection of neighborhoods to intervene, taking into account criteria such as migrant population, gender equity, level of vulnerability and citizen insecurity, among others.
2. Implementation of citizen participation and empowerment mechanisms in the neighborhoods to intervene.
3. Generation of an urban innovation program (open innovation challenges) that establish solutions to solve problems of insecurity in the neighborhoods to intervene.
4. Deployment of strategies for the productive reactivation of the neighborhoods and the conditions of employability of people for example: articulating a neighborhood employment exchange for trades, improving the management of neighborhood stores, identifying productive vocations to promote productive chains with private companies in the area, development of systems that link supply, demand and potential financing of the goods and services promoted by the enterprises in the area.
5. Training and technical assistance to implement urban gardens as a healthy food and livelihood alternative in response to the agri-food strategy applicable at the neighborhood scale.