A total of 99 projects have been submitted to the call for grants from the Biodiversity Foundation of the Ministry for Ecological Transition and the Demographic Challenge (MITECO) dedicated to promoting the renaturalization of urban environments and framed within Component 4 (conservation and restoration of ecosystems and their biodiversity) of the Recovery, Transformation and Resilience Plan (PRTR) of the Government of Spain.
The aim of this call is to strengthen the role of nature in urban environments to increase their biodiversity and improve people’s quality of life and health. To this end, these grants aim to contribute to the development of green infrastructures and the promotion of the connectivity of green and blue spaces, through direct interventions.
All the autonomous communities, in addition to Melilla, are represented in the projects received, which are now entering a process of administrative and technical evaluation. This process will be carried out taking into account strict quality criteria of the initiatives presented.
The projects must be framed in long-term municipal strategies, promote transformative actions, lasting over time and aligned with the objectives of the call itself. It is expected that during the month of June 2022 the resolution will be produced and the projects can begin, which can be developed until December 31, 2025.
This line of aid has a total endowment of 58 million euros (between 2 and 4 million per project). Provincial capitals and municipalities with more than 50,000 inhabitants may be beneficiaries, which may have been grouped together with other entities and bordering municipalities with more than 20,000 inhabitants.
MORE THAN 346 MILLION EUROS REQUESTED
Catalonia, Andalusia, Madrid, the Valencian Community and Castilla y León are the communities that have submitted the most initiatives to this call. Given the volume of proposals received, with a total of 346 million euros requested, it is estimated that only 20% of them can be selected.
To continue supporting these initiatives, a call for the renaturalisation of urban river sections for flood risk reduction is still open, with a budget of 75 million euros, and aimed at all Spanish local entities. A second call for the renaturalisation of cities for 62 million euros is also expected to be published in the coming months. In addition, the Biodiversity Foundation is working to maintain these lines of aid in the coming years.
SUPPORT FOR INNOVATIVE PROJECTS ALIGNED WITH THE OBJECTIVES
In accordance with what is reflected in the call and with the availability of the budget, only projects that are correctly designed and technically and economically dimensioned, that are integrated and respond to public policies, plans or strategies and with a high impact, with a demonstrative effect, scalable and with lasting results over time, will be selected.
In addition, they must be initiatives that clearly promote nature-based solutions, aimed at increasing the presence of natural elements in cities, from an ecosystem approach, that integrate biodiversity as the backbone of interventions, favouring and improving the diversity of habitats in cities, and that contemplate social cohesion in a transversal way through the participation of citizens and social agents.
