9.30–11 a.m. (Geneva time)
The workshop was organized by UNECE in cooperation with the city governments of Grodno and the Ministry of Architecture and Construction of Belarus, with the participation of representatives of UN-Habitat. This event is a part of the UNDA Project “Smart Sustainable Cities for the 2030 Agenda on Sustainable Development and the New Urban Agenda in the UNECE Region” and is aimed at building capacities of local and national governments to produce evidence to feed into the evidence-based policy making process at all levels.
Representatives of national and local government were present in the online workshop. Participants of the workshop were trained on how to establish benchmarks for Key Performance Indicators of the United for Smart Sustainable Cities (U4SSC) Collection Methodology. Benchmarking is the process of assigning a target value – a ‘benchmark’ – for each of the KPIs for SSC. The process is carried out by an evaluator in collaboration with the government, experts (including UNECE) and stakeholders in the field.
Benchmarks should be derived based on existing and/or prospective development objectives and targets, included in, for instance, already existing local/regional/ national policies, plans, programmes, projects, strategies, or standards. Standards could be national sustainable development strategies and national plans (for example, water quality, master plans, local development plans, etc.). International standards produced by, for example, UNECE can be used as the sources of benchmarks.
The role of the government is to submit a list of proposed benchmarks (including the reference information to the sources) to the evaluator. The benchmarks are then discussed between the government, the evaluator and other experts. The government is also encouraged to organize a consultation process with relevant public sector authorities, local civil society organizations, academia, local businesses, international experts (including the UNECE secretariat) and many others to review and validate proposed benchmarks.