{"id":20266,"date":"2026-06-12T09:17:03","date_gmt":"2026-06-12T07:17:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/futurefoodinstitute.org\/?p=20266"},"modified":"2026-06-22T09:19:09","modified_gmt":"2026-06-22T07:19:09","slug":"planet-aqua-when-water-writes-the-future-of-cities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/futurefoodinstitute.org\/ja\/2026\/06\/12\/planet-aqua-when-water-writes-the-future-of-cities\/","title":{"rendered":"Planet Aqua: When Water Writes the Future of Cities"},"content":{"rendered":"

Sometimes you can feel history shifting not in parliaments or boardrooms, but in a room full of mayors and experts staring at flood maps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

That is what happened in Venice during this year\u2019s Climate Week, on an island surrounded by water, under a title borrowed from Jeremy Rifkin<\/strong>\u2019s latest book: Planet Aqua<\/strong><\/em>. Rifkin reminds us that the climate crisis is, above all, a water crisis<\/strong> \u2013 and that our political borders no longer match our hydrological reality. Cities, he argues, are now on the frontline of that mismatch: places where too much water and too little water collide with asphalt, inequality and fragile infrastructure. Once you really see that, you cannot unsee it.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

As curators of Venice Climate Week \u2013 Riccardo Luna, Cristiano Seganfreddo and I<\/strong> \u2013 we have the privilege of not doing this work alone. We stand on the shoulders of two extraordinary allies: Francesco Musco<\/strong> and his academic team at IUAV University of Venice, <\/strong>who are rewriting the science and practice of water-resilient territories, and Stefano Pisani, mayor of Pollica<\/strong>, a pioneer of the \u201cslow cities\u201d movement and of what it really means to design and create a true Blue Community.<\/em> Together with them, we strongly wanted to bring in C40 Cities and build a long-term collaboration grounded in real practices and tangible projects \u2013 not declarations \u2013 to create something that did not yet exist.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In 2025, we started inviting ANCI Italian mayors to Venice Climate Week because we felt they were the missing piece of the conversation. By 2026, we knew the challenge of cities was too big, too urgent and too global to treat as a side panel. So we did something that kept us awake at night \u2013 literally. We created the Planet Aqua Cities Award<\/strong>, and we asked C40 Cities to build it with us.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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The C40 team \u2013 Amanda Ikert, Jennifer Wells and Jules Le Gaudu, together with Pedro Ribeiro, Celeste Espinazo and Lykke Leonardsen \u2013<\/strong> and our partners at Swimmable Cities, led by Matthew Sykes,<\/strong> have been extraordinary travel companions throughout this first edition of the Planet Aqua Cities Award. They brought method, rigour and a deep understanding of city realities, and having Caterina Sarfatti with us in Venice for the awards ceremony made this feel like the start of a real, long-term collaboration grounded in practice, not just words.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Why C40, why now<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

If you care about climate action in cities, you know C40.

It is the network that brings together nearly 100 of the world\u2019s leading cities to confront the climate crisis with science-based targets, shared tools, and a simple conviction: cities are not victims, they are protagonists.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On water, heat and nature, C40 has chosen to lean in hard. Through its Water, Heat and Nature programme and the Water Safe Cities Accelerator, it is helping cities design early warning systems, build nature-based flood defences, secure equitable access to water, and decarbonise their water and wastewater systems. It offers research, technical assistance and a common framework so that mayors from Manila to Medell\u00edn do not have to improvise alone in front of the same storm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

When we approached C40 with the idea of a Planet Aqua Cities Award, the answer was immediate: yes. Not because the world needs another trophy, but because we all felt a gap. We talk endlessly about climate finance, about international negotiations, about national targets. We talk much less about the people who actually sign the contracts, change the zoning codes and stand in front of citizens when the water rises: mayors and city teams<\/strong>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The award was born out of that gap \u2013 and out of a very personal decision: to honour those who are not waiting for permission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Designing the award was the easy part.

The hard part came when the applications started arriving.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We launched the Planet Aqua Cities Award with four categories and an open call. Thirty-seven projects arrived on our desks, from every climate zone and every income level, all answering the same question in different ways: how do you protect a city made of flesh and concrete in the age of Planet Aqua? We shortlisted twelve finalists, nine of them present in Venice, but the truth is that we could feel the energy of all thirty-seven behind every name we announced.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Together with the C40 team and our partners, we spent nights reading through projects from every corner of the world. Manila, Medell\u00edn, Cascais, Barcelona, Hong Kong, Jakarta, Amman, Quito, Fortaleza, Fuzhou, Phoenix, Quezon City\u2026 Twelve cities made it to the final stage, nine of them present in Venice. Each submission came with data, drawings, satellite images, budgets, community stories. Each one, in its own way, was a love letter to a city refusing to surrender to floods, drought, heat or coastal erosion.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We didn\u2019t just evaluate engineering.

We asked: does this project protect the most vulnerable<\/strong>? Does it change the way a city thinks about water? Can it be replicated? Does it create beauty, not only safety?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

By the time we had the shortlist, we were exhausted and exhilarated. Rifkin\u2019s \u201cPlanet Aqua\u201d no longer felt like a metaphor. It felt like a map drawn by mayors.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Frontline Protection: cities as early warning systems<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Our first category, Frontline Protection<\/strong>, honours cities that are not satisfied with sirens and sandbags. They are rewiring their nervous systems, using data, sensors and artificial intelligence to see risk before it hits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n