6/9/2024

In her capacity as C40 Cities Co-Chair and Mayor of Freetown, it was an absolute pleasure and honor to serve as keynote speaker for the C40 Cities Southeast Asia Regional Academy. Hosted by Mayor Joy Belmonte and Quezon City, the largest city (population 3.4m) in the Philippines capital, the event on Inclusive Climate Action brought together city leaders from Jakarta, Indonesia, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and Quezon City as well as C40 Cities Advisors from across the region and from Freetown.
The sessions on gender inclusivity, accessing finance for climate action, youth engagement and multilateral cooperation provided opportunities for Mayor Aki-Sawyerr to share the work that various C40 Cities are doing globally to combat the climate crisis as well as our experiences in Freetown. Peer learning is an essential and effective element of C40 Cities’ operational framework so together with her Freetown C40 Cities team (Pius Nishimwe, Sallieu Kanu and Fatmata Kanyako), the event was also an opportunity for Freetown to learn from others.
Of particular note and interest to us was Quezon City’s urban farming model – the city has approximately

1,300 urban farms across the municipality in places as diverse as the grounds of police stations and areas previously used as illegal dumpsites! This intervention addresses food insecurity caused by climate impacts, greens the city, and provides livelihoods. We will continue to engage the Quezon City urban farming team to learn from them as we scale up our existing urban farming interventions in Freetown.