Four finalists for the Transformative Actions Awards have been announced. The award, funded by the Basque Country and the City of Aalborg (Denmark), rewards current or concluded Transformative Actions that address the three pathways of the Basque Declaration: Socio-cultural transformation, socio-economic transformation, and technological transformation.

The shortlisted candidates are Zaragoza (Spain), for their project on turning citizens into “city makers” by putting their ideas into action; Mannheim (Germany), for their project on making energy and climate measures more visible; Udaltalde 21 Nerbioi-Ibaizabal (Spain), for their project on creating a common sustainability agenda in neighbouring municipalities; and Nilüfer (Turkey), whose project focused on using neighbourhood committees to increase civic engagement.

The winners will be announced and the award presented at a ceremony at the European Committee of the Regions (CoR) in Brussels (Belgium) on 22 November. The finalists were chosen after extensive deliberations of a jury comprised of Arantza Acha (Director, UNESCO Etxea Spain); Thomas Kastrup-Larsen (Mayor of Aalborg, Denmark); Wolfgang Teubner (Regional Director, ICLEI European Secretariat); and Cor Lamers (Mayor of Schiedam, Netherlands and Chair of ENVE Commission).

Speaking about the importance of the Transformative Action Awards, jury member Arantza Acha said: “The Transformative Action Award showcases bold and innovative examples of how to transform our societies to achieve multidimensional sustainability in line with the Basque Declaration”. The Mayor of Aalborg, Thomas Kastrup-Larsen, also described The Transformative Actions Award as “a fantastic way of highlighting exemplary approaches to sustainability issues. All submissions showed truly inspiring solutions to the challenges we are facing and I urge everyone to study them closer.”

For more information on the shortlisted candidates, visit the sustainable cities website.