AGORA

Just and inclusive climate adaptation

ABOUT THE PROJECT

In order to promote the involvement of local communities in climate action, it is essential that they are well informed and aware of the impacts that climate change may have on their respective cities or towns.

The AGORA project aims to meaningfully and effectively engage local communities in climate action, accelerating and scaling up the adaptation process to build a climate-resilient Europe. To this end, ‘agoras’ will be set up in four pilot regions: Rome (Italy), Aragon (Spain), Dresden (Germany) and Malmö (Sweden). In these regions, a series of participatory workshops will identify key climate vulnerabilities and co-design solutions to improve adaptive capacity in a fair and inclusive manner. These workshops will involve citizens, civil society organisations, the scientific community, policy makers and the private sector.

In addition to the pilot regions, the project also involves follower regions who will be kept up to date with our activities, progress and results throughout the project. In this way, they will learn from our experience and will be able to replicate similar actions in their local contexts to promote climate change adaptation across Europe.

Therefore, AGORA also aims to combat misinformation on climate change by designing tools and materials to improve the capacity of citizens to deal with misinformation campaigns that are disseminated through different media.

PROJECT CHARACTERISTICS

Project Type: European

Duration: 2023 – 2025

PROJECT OBJECTIVES

The AGORA project has two main objectives:

(1) To facilitate and encourage the active participation of various actors (citizens, civil organisations, the scientific community, policy makers and entrepreneurs) in all stages of climate change adaptation, thus supporting the European Adaptation Mission. To this end, ‘agoras’ will be set up in four pilot regions: Rome (Italy), Aragon (Spain), Dresden (Germany) and Malmö (Sweden). In these regions, a series of participatory workshops will identify key climate vulnerabilities and co-design solutions to improve adaptive capacity in a fair and inclusive manner.

(2) Combat climate change misinformation campaigns. In this regard, we will develop a digital academy that will provide citizens with a range of resources and educational materials to help them improve their ability to detect misinformation. In addition, we plan to develop a mobile application for the same purpose, but in a more interactive format, similar to a trivia game. In this way, citizens will be able to test their knowledge of climate change and demonstrate their ability to debunk climate change-related hoaxes.

IBERCIVIS’ ROLE

Ibercivis is in charge of coordinating all activities carried out in the Aragon pilot. These activities include participatory workshops aimed at identifying climate vulnerabilities in the Aragon region, assessing existing strategies for citizen participation in climate action, and promoting the co-creation of soft climate change adaptation solutions. We will also carry out several events under the themes of misinformation and climate change to raise awareness on these issues. On the other hand, the Ibercivis team will also be in charge of developing the mobile application to fight misinformation and will support the creation of content on misinformation and climate change, which will be accessible through the digital academy. In addition, during the first year of the project, Ibercivis is reviewing other European projects on climate change adaptation and misinformation, in order to know the state of the art and identify gaps that can be addressed through the different activities that will be carried out throughout the project.

OUR ACTIVITIES

– Review of EU-funded projects related to climate change adaptation and disinformation. The aim is to compile the resources generated in these projects for possible replication or adaptation to AGORA’s objectives, as well as the creation of innovative resources through the project itself.
– Coordination of the pilot project in Aragon, which involves community building, design and implementation of various activities.
– Development of the mobile application.
– Support for the creation of new resources and training materials aimed at strengthening the capacity of citizens to detect misinformation.
– Translation into Spanish of the different resources and materials generated within the project.
– Communication and dissemination of all project activities in Spain.