A willingness to learn. Players keen to collaborate. Clear city challenges. And innovative solutions on the field. These are the elements already at hand to make our cities smarter, cleaner and more sustainable. Earlier this month, 34 ingenious companies from the Netherlands headed to Barcelona for this year’s Smart City Expo.

It's official! Breakdancing will be an official Olympic Sport at the Paris 2024 Games. But what does this mean for the future of the sport, the community around it, and the global impact it's creating? 

2022 was international Year of Groundwater. The year ended with a UN Groundwater Conference and a plan to intergrate solutions to groundwater challenges.

A recent report co-authored by the International Labour Organization shows that if investment in nature-based solutions (NbS) is tripled, the implementation of nature-based solutions could:  

• create 20 million jobs 
• protect biodiversity and the climate 
• restore depleted land 

The Circularity Gap Report 2023 was presented in Amsterdam during the World Economic Forum in mid-January. Unfortunately the news is not good. Circularity has fallen from 9.1 percent in 2018 to 7.2 percent today. That means proportionatly less raw materials are entering the circular economy when we need that figure to grow.

Today, people worldwide buy more clothes, due to rising availability of cheaper brands. But while 'fast fashion' makes dressing with style more affordable, it comes with a huge price tag for our planet. According to the World Economic Forum, the fashion industry produces 10% of all humanity's carbon emissions. It is also the second-largest consumer of the world's water supply. 

Rising sea levels, drought and extreme weath­er are becoming more and more frequent, as climate change is coming closer to home. But how to capture that in a picture? Back in 2022, in the run up to the COP27 in Egypt, the Neth­erlands called on photography enthusiasts from around the world to create and share in­spirational and thought-provoking environ­mental photography in our Water = Life photo competition.