Hi, as some of you may be aware IPCC is organizing its first ever meet on cities titled Cities and Climate Change Science Conference 2018 in Edmonton, Canada from 5-7 March (https://citiesipcc.org/). Its aim is to foster new scientific knowledge for cities based on science, practice and policy. I have been invited to chair a session on "Co-benefits: Practical experiences, lessons learned, knowledge gaps and policy imperatives to change urbanization paths in the emerging economies". The aim of this session is to discuss the necessary changes in current urbanization and GHG path in rapidly developing countries, having climate co-benefits as an approach. As evidence, there would be case studies from China, India, Brazil, Iran and Turkey.
The organizers are further open to have inputs from a wider community including experts, practitioners, thinkers and commoners who would like to suggest how climate action agenda could be better mainstreamed into planning and management of cities. Help us identify one priority research gap or a topic that you think is underrepresented in the discussions related to cities and climate change, and is crucial to generate action.
In order to make this session truly representative of people's aspirations from different countries following diverse techno-societal systems, I invite you to offer your suggestions. Please explain your ideas clearly and concisely. In the end, I would analyze these and report all the relevant suggestions in the conference proceeding, hence I encourage you to identify yourself, so that this exercise becomes more credible... Dr Mahendra Sethi, New Delhi