Process support, preparation and monitoring of the poverty report of the city of Reinbek

With the 2030 Agenda, all member states of the United Nations have decided to shape the world in an ecologically, economically and socially sustainable way from an equal and inclusive perspective. Germany cannot achieve the sustainability goals adopted in the Agenda without local authorities as key players. This is because municipalities, cities and communities form an important bridge between governments and citizens when it comes to implementing the 2030 Agenda. The Agenda touches on all areas of municipal action, which therefore play a key role in implementing the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Goal 11 “Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable” therefore explicitly places responsibility on the municipal level.

Reinbek takes its responsibility as a municipality seriously and initiated the development of the poverty report. This was developed against the background of the UN Sustainable Development Goals with the active and lively participation of civil society, administration and politics. Reinbek is thus embracing the UN Sustainable Development Goals and making an active contribution to their implementation.

At the committee meeting of the Social and School Committee of the City of Reinbek on 26 April 2019, it was decided to prepare a poverty report for the city of Reinbek with the participation of key stakeholders in the city.

The approach:

The poverty report looks at the topics mainly from a local perspective, but attempts to recognise Reinbek’s interactions on a global level. The city recognises that poverty cannot be understood from a purely sectoral approach, but must be addressed in the context of ecological, economic and social issues. Relative poverty is considered here, which takes into account an undersupply of material and immaterial goods and a restriction of life opportunities in comparison to the prosperity of society. Poverty is based on social inequality.

Anke Butscher and Nynke Hack from corsus designed and accompanied the entire process, collected and analysed important data and key figures, designed and moderated the participation process and compiled all the information and recommendations into a final poverty report.

Five workshops were dedicated to the different subject areas of the poverty report. A qualitative and quantitative inventory was used to collate the city’s data and activities. These were the starting point for the discussions on poverty in Reinbek and served as the basis for the development of recommendations for action for politicians and the administration. The focus was on an open discussion with all stakeholders involved in order to identify challenges and opportunities and to be able to reflect different perspectives in the poverty report. Both voluntary and full-time stakeholders were invited in a flexible, thematic composition. Dr Anke Butscher and Nynke Hack from corsus used the results to compile the poverty report and developed strategic and operational goals and measures, including social monitoring. The poverty report based on the SDGs is now to be updated and published every two years in Reinbek.

In cooperation with the Reinbek city administration, representatives of local politics and municipal stakeholders, corsus 2022-23 has compiled and analysed information and key figures on the implementation status of the operational goals set. A monitoring report (update of the poverty report) presents the developments and implementation of the objectives over the last few years.

The information and key figures collected were used to measure developments in relation to the following SDGs:

SDG 1 No poverty
SDG 4 Quality education
SDG 5 Gender equality
SDG 8 Decent work and economic growth
SDG 10 Reduced inequalities
SDG 11 Sustainable cities and communities
SDG 12 Sustainable consumption & production
SDG 16 Peace, justice and strong institutions
SDG 17 Partnerships for the goals

The poverty report is to be converted into a sustainability strategy and a sustainability report following a decision by the Education & Social Affairs Committee.

“corsus was instrumental in designing and managing the process. Dr Anke Butscher’s professional, structured, reliable and binding approach helped the city of Reinbek to identify important parameters with the poverty report. This enables us to take well-founded measures to contribute to greater social sustainability and the reduction of poverty in our city.”

Torsten Christ, Head of Social and Civic Affairs of the City of Reinbek