Cilab Alicante was created as a collaborative space to provide solutions to the social and environmental challenges of the city of Alicante using collective intelligence.
It is a joint initiative of the Regional Ministry of Innovation and the Local Development Agency coordinated within the Alicante Futura and Territoris Innovadors strategies.
The Alicante Citizen Lab (Cilab Alicante) is a joint initiative of the Alicante Local Development Agency ‘Impulsalicante’ and the Regional Ministry of Innovation, Universities, Science and Digital Society, with an experimental and participatory methodology that is aligned with the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and with the Alicante 2030 Urban Agenda and the municipal digital strategy Alicante Futura and the regional strategy Territoris Innovadors. Cilab Alicante was created to identify problems and possible solutions concerning the city of Alicante, with criteria of co-creation, innovation and sustainability.
The aim of this project, promoted by Alicante City Council through the Local Development Agency, is to propose and carry out improvements for the city of Alicante in the social and environmental fields from a global perspective. Citizens and social entities, academic and scientific knowledge centres, the business world and public administrations are the agents required to participate and collaborate in a proactive and inclusive manner.
The Councillor for Employment and Development of Alicante City Council and head of the Local Development Agency, Mari Carmen de España, explained that “Cilab Alicante seeks transformation through social innovation to improve the social and environmental quality of life of all Alicante citizens. Making them participants, responsible and committed, improving coexistence and eliminating inequalities with open and transparent proposals, with the joint effort between administrations, civil society, universities and training centres, business and social entities”.
The intelligence of the whole is key to bringing about changes that will enrich the city of Alicante in the coming years. Moreover, it is a challenge that will serve as a prototype for other cities.
This is the first urban innovation laboratory to be created within the “Territorios Innovadores” municipal innovation promotion programme of the Regional Ministry of Innovation, with a budget of 2.8 million euros, of which €150,000 has been earmarked for the Cilab.
In this regard, the director general, Sonia Tirado, said that “innovation is the only possible way to respond to current social and environmental challenges, to make our environment a more sustainable and inclusive place, and to offer better public services. The Government of Catalonia offers the Territorios Innovadores programme to support municipalities, but it is up to each city to decide what it wants to be in the future. And this involves planning actions and involving all citizens in the design of policies: administration, businesses, universities and civil society.
Citizen participation
Citizens can participate in this phase at two levels:
Presentation
The on-site conference will take place on Friday 28 October at the College of Architects of Alicante, from 12:00 to 14:30 hours or from 17:00 to 20:00 hours. It will define a set of social and environmental challenges for the city of Alicante, based on those that citizens are choosing in this first phase of the laboratory, open on the web.
The final work will be presented at the press conference to be held on 3 November and on the laboratory’s website. Everyone is called upon to collaborate in order to exercise their rights and take on commitments and responsibilities in this experimental creation. More than 100 groups and 250 respondents have already been counted in the first phase of diagnosis and information, and more are joining every day.
In this first phase, the Cilab Alicante programme has conducted interviews and participatory debate workshops, social studies, group dynamics, as well as streaming videoconferences with local and national experts.
The Alicante Citizen Lab collaborates with other national labs such as Medialab Granada, Las Naves de Valencia, Laboratorio de Vitoria Gasteiz, Medialab Prado de Madrid, Citilab de Cornellá, Impulsa Zaragoza or Coboilab Sant Boi de Llobregat, as well as others from the European Network of Citizen Labs (EnoLL).
