On Monday the 17th of January, IUCN organised the EU’s Nature-based Solutions Task Force Cluster Meeting, as a part of the Horizon 2020 NetworkNature project, which serves as a platform for the scaling of Nature-based Solutions. The goal of the cluster meeting was to bring together participants of different Task forces for an interactive dialogue, as well as review all the Nature-based Solutions projects that were financed through Horizon 2020 in the past years.
The meeting furthermore served to provide participating organizations with new insights and skills. Nature^Squared was asked to organize a workshop about engaging unusual partners in realising urban Nature-based Solutions. For this meeting, we adapted our Serious Game Financing Nature-based Solutions into an online version. Playing this game provided the participants with several important insights:
- The importance of a shared vision
- The importance of being able to position yourself in someone else’s shoes and speaking the same language
- The importance of a personal connection for starting innovative processes
- The possibilities of thinking outside the box when envisaged partners don’t engage.
The workshop ended with a call to action to always calculate a green scenario in area development projects and to cooperate with partners when developing new financial arrangements. Even when this scenario can’t be fully realised, cooperation presents the opportunity of stretching the limits every time.
