JRC city survey: Priorities for and barriers to Urban Green Transitions

The Joint Research Centre (JRC) of the European Commission and the University Politecnico di Torino, Italy have collaborated in the creation of a new survey to aid EU local authorities in implementing the EU Green Deal. The survey aims to further understanding surrounding the priorities and barriers to Urban Green Transitions.

The objective of this research is to inform the next European Commission regarding policy and target priorities for EU cities. This forms part of a wider sustainability gap analysis by the JRC. The specific objectives of the survey are to understand what policies and targets a priority within the EU Green Deal (EGD) framework are and to identify the structural conditions and barriers that may act as a barrier to the achievement of those goals.

The survey also aims to collect suggestions on what urban issues should be focused on in future urban-level policies, as well as gather best practice examples of EGD implementation across the EU. 

Participants of the survey are required to complete two tasks:

1. The first is an assessment of EU policy targets relevant to achieving the Green Deal in urban contexts. Participants are asked to rank these policies from 1 to 10, where 1 indicates low-impact and 10 is high-impact. This will help the commission identify which policies are seen to boost the Green Transition in EU cities.
2. The second part of the survey asks relevant stakeholders to assess the urgency of certain structural conditions, identified in the survey, by ranking them by most to least urgent.

This is followed by more targeted questions regarding certain key areas of the EU Green Deal, such as the Industrial Strategy for Circular Economy or the area of Sustainable and Smart Mobility.

The EU Green Deal is a package of policy initiatives that aim to support the EU’s transition towards a more just and circular economy. This deal is seen as a cornerstone in advancing climate neutrality by 2050 and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in the EU.

The Green Transition can be complex, as it involves the intersection of social, economic and political systems. The direct involvement of Local and Regional authorities (LRAs) is a necessary means for the successful implementation of EGD policies.

This survey comes at a time of transition, as the mandate of the current Commission ends. It is time to reflect on what the “future” of the Green Deal is going to be, and how LRAs and the Commission can work together to achieve it.

The survey takes 10-15 minutes and is open until 23 December 2023.

To respond to the survey, click here.