Bloomberg Philanthropies 2021 Mayors Challenge Names Top 50 Global Urban Innovations Emerging From Pandemic
PR90069
NEW YORK, June 15, 2021 /PRNewswire=KYODO JBN/ --
-- As Mayors Challenge Innovation Competition Proceeds, 50 Finalist Cities Set
to Strengthen Ideas with Residents in Coming Months
-- Grand Prize Winners to be Chosen Early 2022
Bloomberg Philanthropies today announced (
) the 50 Champion Cities, representing the boldest urban innovations of the
past year, that will advance to the finalist stage of the 2021 Global Mayors
Challenge, a worldwide innovation competition that encourages and spreads the
cities' most promising ideas. This year's program focuses on elevating the most
important public innovations generated in response to the global COVID-19
pandemic.
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The 50 cities named today hail from 29 nations on 6 continents. They emerged
from a highly competitive applicant pool: Mayors from 631 cities in 99
countries submitted their most promising ideas for consideration which is
nearly twice the number of cities that applied in Bloomberg Philanthropies'
last Mayors Challenge, held in the United States in 2018. The finalists were
elevated based on four criteria: Vision, potential for impact, feasibility, and
transferability.
The ideas provide a powerful snapshot of the innovation priorities of the
world's cities. At the global level, innovations focusing on improving health
and reducing unemployment were most common. Racial justice emerged as the area
of highest priority for U.S. cities, while social inclusion topped the European
submissions. In Africa, where the world is experiencing its fastest rates of
urbanization, infrastructure was dominant. Nearly half of the submissions were
generated in part through participatory processes with residents.
"These 50 finalists are showing the world that in the face of the pandemic's
enormous challenges, cities are rising to meet them with bold, innovative, and
ambitious ideas," said Michael R. Bloomberg, founder of Bloomberg LP and
Bloomberg Philanthropies and 108th mayor of New York City. "By helping these
cities test their ideas over the coming months, we will have a chance to
identify cutting-edge policies and programs that can allow cities to rebuild in
ways that make them stronger and healthier, and more equal and more just."
The 50 Champion Cities of the 2021 Global Mayors Challenge are:
-- Africa (16% of Finalists):
-- Cape Town, South Africa: Transforming soup kitchens into a sustainable
food-distribution infrastructure
-- Danané, Côte d'Ivoire: Transforming mobility for vulnerable residents
-- Freetown, Sierra Leone: Incentivizing community action to combat urban
deforestation
-- Kigali, Rwanda: Adopting proven rainwater-harvesting technologies in
informal communities
-- Kumasi, Ghana: Training unemployed youth to create new household toilet
technologies
-- Lusaka, Zambia: Incentivizing the repurposing of trash into needed
products
-- Meru, Kenya: Using Black Soldier Fly larvae to fix an inadequate waste
collection system
-- Umuaka, Nigeria: Digital support for survivors of gender-based violence
-- Asia-Pacific (16% of Finalists):
-- Auckland, New Zealand: Calculating carbon emissions for infrastructure
development
-- Butuan, Philippines: Leveraging predictive data to bolster local
farmers
-- Daegu, South Korea: Digital permissioning to bring new life to urban
spaces
-- Manila, Philippines: Building a 21st-century data infrastructure to
improve city services
-- Pune, India: Building the foundation for an all-electric-vehicle future
-- Rourkela, India: Supporting solar-powered cold storage—plus women
entrepreneurship—to reduce food waste
-- Taipei, Taiwan: Using virtual reality to promote safe, active
lifestyles for seniors
-- Wellington, New Zealand: Leveraging a city digital-twin to encourage
resident engagement on climate action
-- Europe (16% of Finalists):
-- Bilbao, Spain: Building a cybersecure city and citizenry
-- Glasgow, United Kingdom: Unleashing a neighborhood-level participatory
approach to community wellbeing
-- Istanbul, Turkey: Creating a platform for individual philanthropy at a
city-wide scale
-- Leuven, Belgium: Using 'civic contracts' to drive individual and
organizational climate action
-- London, United Kingdom: Deploying rapid, upstream interventions to
prevent chronic homelessness
-- Paris, France: Offering free climate-activism education for Parisian
youth
-- Rotterdam, The Netherlands: Using digital tokens to incentivize social
impact from the private sector
-- Vilnius, Lithuania: Building a resilient, post-COVID model for hybrid
learning
-- South America (16% of Finalists):
-- Bogotá, Colombia: Creating "care blocks" to shift the gender inequity
of care
-- Cartagena, Colombia: Pioneering a gender-aware approach to emergency
response
-- La Paz, Bolivia: Co-designing nine new urban centers with residents to
ensure equitable access to services
-- Recife, Brazil: Deploying a unique mix of services to foster women's
entrepreneurship at scale
-- Renca, Chile: Enlisting the wisdom of seniors to create
community-development projects and reduce isolation.
-- Rio de Janeiro, Brazil: Improving housing conditions in favelas using
cutting-edge mapping technology.
-- Rosario, Argentina: Formalizing and subsidizing informal waste
collection
-- Tunja, Colombia: Transforming public space with a circular-economy lens
-- Middle East (4% of Finalists):
-- Amman, Jordan: Using "reachability maps" to improve the city's
emergency response and guide investments
-- Tel Aviv-Yafo, Israel: Engaging youth to make the city's cultural
center more resilient
-- North America (32% of Finalists):
-- Akron, Ohio: Taking lessons from how we train medical students to
support Black entrepreneurs
-- Baltimore, Maryland: Deploying a citywide, coordinated system to
support Black owned businesses
-- Birmingham, Alabama: Investing in the next generation of food
entrepreneurs
-- Columbus, Ohio: Providing last-mile Wi-Fi access to underserved
neighborhoods
-- Durham, North Carolina: Building a team to help residents access
untapped federal resources and support
-- Guadalajara, Mexico: Creating a "citizen-safety index" to combat
violent crime
-- Hermosillo, Mexico: Providing new employment opportunities for women in
the circular economy
-- Lansing, Michigan: Launching cross-sectoral partnerships to halt
learning loss in children
-- Long Beach, California: Using the city's power to bring transparency to
the gig economy
-- Louisville, Kentucky: Creating the diverse tech workforce of the future
-- New Orleans, Louisiana: Bringing a trust-building lens to the delivery
of public services
-- Newark, New Jersey: Reducing crime by focusing on the city's most
persistent offenders
-- Paterson, New Jersey: Providing proven, on-demand treatment to those
struggling with opioid addiction
-- Phoenix, Arizona: Deploying "career mobility units" to support job-
seekers
-- Rochester, Minnesota: Creating a pathway for women of color into the
growing, high-paying local construction field
-- San Jose, California: Bolstering the college-support pipeline for
marginalized families
The Mayors Challenge selection committee helped Bloomberg Philanthropies select
the 50 finalists. The committee is co-chaired by Bloomberg Philanthropies
board member Mellody Hobson, Co-CEO & President, Ariel Investments, and David
Miliband, President & CEO, International Rescue Committee, and includes a wide
range of global experts: Sir David Adjaye, OBE Founder, Adjaye Associates; Dr.
Yogan Pillay, Country Director for South Africa and Senior Global Director for
Universal Health Coverage, Clinton Health Access Initiative; Jagan Shah, Senior
Infrastructure Adviser, Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, British
High Commission, New Delhi; Linda Gibbs, Principal, Bloomberg Associates; Julia
Gillard, 27th Prime Minister of Australia; Olafur Eliasson, Artist; Gael Garcia
Bernal, actor and producer; Dr. Jan-Emmanuel De Neve, Professor of Economics
and Director, Wellbeing Research Centre, University of Oxford; Ms. Phumzile
Mlambo-Ngcuka, United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Executive Director of
UN Women; Federica Mogherini, Rector, College of Europe and Former High
Representative of the Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy; Dr. Joshua
Sharfstein, Director, Bloomberg American Health Initiative, Johns Hopkins
Bloomberg School of Public Health; Jennifer Pahlka, Founder and Former
Executive Director, Code for America; and Mariana Costa Checa, Co-Founder And
CEO, Laboratoria.
"The level of creativity and innovation among this year's fifty Champion Cities
is a clear sign that cities are continuing to step up amid even the biggest
challenges," said Mellody Hobson. "I look forward to seeing these ideas begin
to come to life in the next phase of the competition."
"With fifty Champion Cities come fifty exciting opportunities to foster
innovative ideas," said David Miliband. "The next Champion Phase will equip
city leaders with critical tools to test, learn, and grow these solutions."
The 50 finalist cities will now enter a four-month testing phase to refine
their ideas with technical assistance from Bloomberg Philanthropies and its
network of leading innovation experts. Fifteen of the 50 cities will ultimately
win the grand prize, with each receiving $1 million and robust multi-year
technical assistance to implement and scale their ideas.
"This is always an especially exciting phase of the Mayors Challenge, helping
mayors push their innovations to even greater heights," said James Anderson,
head of Government Innovation at Bloomberg Philanthropies. "While 15 cities
will ultimately take home grand prizes, all 50 cities receive world class
coaching and support to improve their ideas and their potential to improve
lives."
Click here(
) for more details on the Champion Cities' proposals. Watch the announcement
video here(
).
The 2021 Global Mayors Challenge builds on the success of four previous
Bloomberg Philanthropies Challenges in the U.S. (2013 and 2018), Europe (2014),
and Latin America and the Caribbean (2016). Previous Mayors Challenge grand
prizewinners include Los Angeles, California's tackling of the city's
homelessness crisis by making it easier and cheaper to build accessory dwelling
units (ADUs); Stockholm, Sweden's project to convert plant waste into biochar
to encourage plant growth; and Barcelona, Spain helping senior citizens build
community through technology. For more information, visit
https://bloombergcities.jhu.edu/mayors-challenge and @BloombergCities on
Twitter and Instagram.
About Bloomberg Philanthropies
Bloomberg Philanthropies invests in 810 cities and 170 countries around the
world to ensure better, longer lives for the greatest number of people. The
organization focuses on five key areas for creating lasting change: the Arts,
Education, Environment, Government Innovation, and Public Health. Bloomberg
Philanthropies encompasses all of Michael R. Bloomberg's giving, including his
foundation, corporate, and personal philanthropy as well as Bloomberg
Associates, a pro bono consultancy that works in cities around the world. In
2020, Bloomberg Philanthropies distributed $1.6 billion. For more information,
please visit bloomberg.org or follow us on Facebook(
), Instagram(
), YouTube(
), Twitter, and TikTok(
).
SOURCE: Bloomberg Philanthropies
CONTACT: Jennifer Wlach, Mercury, jwlach@mercuryllc.com OR Ty Trippet,
Bloomberg Philanthropies, ty@bloomberg.org
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