Deadline: 24 August 2026 (23:59 CEST Time)

Background

NetZeroCities, through Special Grant Agreement 2 (SGA2) Task 1.6, ‘Sub-European Peer-to-Peer Collaboration’, is actively working to provide tailored support in various national contexts. The aim is to provide additional support to cities, foster communities of practice between cities in each country, i.e. to strengthen city-to-city collaboration spaces at national level and thus help to reinforce national support structures for climate neutral cities (national platforms). To achieve this, NZC has developed a country-specific support framework tailored to the unique characteristics and needs of each context.
In practice, the subcontractor will deliver the following activities (find detailed description under Activities), building on what has already been achieved and delivered in the Turkish context:

  • External communication and outreach – Promote the EU Cities Mission in Türkiye.
  • Internal communication, coordination, and knowledge management – Develop and maintain the Community of Practice amongst Turkish cities, incl. capacity-building activities, piloting implementation opportunities, systematic communication.
  • Pathways for implementation – Develop actionable recommendations and pathways to implement climate transition projects in cities, while building multilevel and multi-stakeholder partnerships.

Scope

In the context of the efforts of Turkish cities within the EU Mission for 100 Climate-Neutral and Smart
Cities, and specifically the opportunity identified to provide additional support to the community of cities working toward the Mission’s objectives within the Turkish national ecosystem, NetZeroCities
/ Climate KIC is requesting a quotation for services from an organisation or individual able to operate
within this national context. The role involves supporting teams from NetZeroCities, as relevant, to take charge of and facilitate the process described below. The following is a general description of the services and actions to be provided by the awarded
supplier, followed in subsequent sections with detailed information.

  1. Expert support aimed at fostering collaboration between cities with regards to financing climate transition in Turkish cities, with specific focus on built environment – both on the technical and socio-economic aspects (four dialogue meetings and one Policy Brief), increasing their capacities and improving the cooperation of the community of practice of cities with national authorities, and different stakeholders in Türkiye. This support will be directed towards Turkish cities that are already participating in the Mission activities (e.g. Mission and Twin Cities) as well as other interested cities wanting to achieve climate neutrality. Additionally, the learnings from this process will be disseminated with a wider group of cities via webinars.
  2. Coordination support aimed at establishing coherent collaboration processes for Turkish cities, regular meetings, feedback loops, process documentation, meaningful links to national authorities and other relevant stakeholders (“secretariat” function).
  3. Support transition from planning to implementation, addressing systemic barriers in governance, finance, and delivery of climate actions.
  4. Organisation of two annual EU Cities’ Mission Events / Türkiye (one in 2026 and one in 2027) to promote the EU Cities Mission and its activities in Türkiye amongst wide group of cities as well as other relevant stakeholders.

Presentations and technical support will take place predominantly in Turkish; therefore, presenters must be fluent in Turkish. The collaboration and interaction with NetZeroCities partners will be in English and full professional proficiency in English of those engaged in the delivery is mandatory.

The general objective of the described support is to enhance collaboration between cities and other relevant stakeholders in the Turkish context with a particular focus on the built environment as the primary arena through the development of the systemic pathways for implementation of climate neutrality, as well as organising complementary capacity building activities that can support the process and/or communicate its progress to a wider community of cities. Specifically, it aims to strengthen the exchange between cities on climate neutrality (Community of Practice) and the national support for climate neutral cities (“National Platform”) in Türkiye. To this end, strong internal coordination skills (knowledge sharing and management, delivery of collaborative processes, maintaining long term collaboration) as well as external outreach and communication skills (multilevel and multi-stakeholder collaboration, awareness raising, promotion) are crucial.

Additionally, this targeted support is intended as seed funding with the primary objective of maximising impact by strengthening collaborative networks within each country. Therefore, this initiative also aims to serve as kick-start and to encourage the continuity of funding once the support described in this RfP is completed.

Timeline and additional information

Interested parties are invited to submit their proposals by 24 August 2026 (23:59 CEST Time) to Luisa Carretti and Shuva Thapa [CESF@netzerocities.eu]. Proposals should include and address all specific requirements related to the request which can be found below.