Federal Conference of Municipalities and Initiatives

Local, community-based ‘One World’ and ‘Agenda 21’ work is becoming more important all the time. The Federal Conferences of Municipalities and Initiatives, which have been taking place for 20 years, are a concrete manifestation of the growing role of local actors in development cooperation. The Service Agency Communities in One World organised the conference for the first time in 2004. That Germany-wide conference was the ninth of its kind, and brought together municipal administrators and policymakers, representatives of umbrella organisations, non-governmental organisations, service providers and academics. It continued the tradition of the previous eight conferences, which had focused on development issues.

The history of these all-Germany meetings began in Mainz in 1988 with the first Federal Conference of North-South Forums and Initiatives. At the eighth conference held in 2001 in Bonn, a decision was taken to set up a service agency for local development cooperation. In December of that same year this decision was implemented by establishing the Service Agency Communities in One World. The Service Agency took over the activities and tasks of the Centre for Municipal Development Cooperation, which was dissolved. It thus also became responsible for organising the Federal Conferences of Municipalities and Initiatives.

As a key service provider for sustainable local development and municipal development cooperation, we therefore provide a forum for dialogue and networking at the conferences. Following the conferences held in Magdeburg in 2004, Hamburg in 2006 and Munich in 2009, the next federal conference will be held in Mainz in June 2012. It will be entitled ‘More engagement for municipal development cooperation’.