The conference reaffirmed the network's primary goal of creating a more resilient, innovative, and united Baltic Sea region.
Cities need to be at the table, not on the menu
With these key words, UBC President Mantas Jurgutis addressed the conference participants. In these tumultuous times, it's vital to have strong and consolidated messages amplifying the city voices.
The tone of the conference was set by two high-level plenary sessions. The opening plenary emphasized a common message: cities need to be acknowledged as important collaborators in determining the future of Europe.
This session included European and local leaders: Magdalena Adamowicz (Member of the European Parliament), Krystyna Danilecka-Wojewódzka (Mayor of Słupsk), Aleksandra Dulkiewicz (Mayor of Gdańsk, Member of CoR), Mantas Jurgutis (UBC President), Dr Gustav Lindström (Director General, CBSS), Henryka Mościcka-Dendys (Undersecretary of State, Polish MFA), Marcin Skwierawski (Deputy Marshal, Pomorskie Voivodeship), and video addresses from Themis Christophidou (DG Regio) and André Sobczak (Eurocities).
The second plenary explored cities’ access to EU funds within the MFF 2028–2035, featuring contributions from Kieran McCarthy (CoR), Claire Roumet (Energy Cities), Laura Omucińska (Słupsk), Linda Ozola (Riga), and Henrik Johansson (Växjö). The discussion highlighted both opportunities and challenges for cities in navigating EU programmes.
"Cities are the link between Europe and its citizens, those who turn plans into actions,"
— Magdalena Adamowicz, Member of the European Parliament
Ten seminars and multiple study visits offered practical exchanges on resilience, youth policy, tourism decarbonization, and maritime development in addition to policy discussions.
Urban sustainability arena
Among the topical discussions, two sessions were organized by our Sustainable Cities Commission. Our meet & greet session introduced to the member cities the spectrum of cooperation opportunities, from running projects and upcoming events to the offered tailored trainings to increase the professional capacities of the city employees in the fields of sustainability.
Many of these arise from the transnational project cooperation, which creates opportunities for cities beyond the existing consortia to make use of the jointly developed solutions. These include a.o.:
- Training modules for cities to prepare Sustainable Urban Mobility Plans – starting in January 2026
- International conference on plastic waste reduction launched by BALTIPLAST project, taking place in Turku on 10-11 December 2025
- UBC TALKS webinar about climate budget on 2 December – and the connected event-based climate budget course starting from January 2026
Photo by Mariia Andreeva.
Further, during the conference we launched the workshop “Urban sustainability arena for sharing success strategies and solutions”, to proceed with the mid-term evaluation process of the UBC Sustainability Action Programme 2030. A lot of valuable feedback was collected from the member cities to help us revise the current document and consider possible updates since its original launch in 2021.