ICLEI Southeast Asia (SEA) conducted in-depth training workshops on climate data reporting and local climate action planning with 11 Philippine cities from July to October 2025 as part of its partnership with the World Wide Fund For Nature Philippines (WWF-Philippines) for the One Planet Cities (OPC) program.

Now in its 2025-2026 cycle, the OPC program aims to assist cities worldwide to act as transformation catalysts, implementing integrated and inclusive plans in line with the 1.5 degrees Celsius goal of the Paris Agreement, ensuring urban resilience, and unlocking individual and collective climate actions. WWF established the program in 2011. Meanwhile, implementation in the Philippines started in 2015, marking this cycle’s 10th year of working with local governments and communities on climate action in the country. 

Meanwhile, the One Planet Cities Challenge (OPCC), the program’s flagship activity, is a friendly competition that aims to develop and disseminate the best practices in climate mitigation and adaptation of cities worldwide by encouraging participating cities to report their climate actions, strategies, and data through a standardized international platform. Since the OPCC’s inception, WWF has partnered with ICLEI mainly through the use of its online reporting platform for climate data, the CDP-ICLEI Track.

ICLEI SEA conducted the training in the cities of Bacolod, Balanga, Butuan, Calapan, Carmona, Island Garden City of Samal (IGACOS), Iloilo, Ligao, Oroquieta, and Tayabas, which are participating in the OPC for the first time; and in the city of La Carlota, which has previously participated in the OPC. Santa Rosa City, Laguna and Legazpi City, Albay—also previous OPC participants—were also engaged through light-touch activities.

Staff from local government offices involved in climate data reporting and climate action planning attended the training workshops.

Workshops on the CDP-ICLEI Track were conducted in the 10 cities.

Workshops on GHG inventory (GHGi) training were also conducted in Bacolod, Ligao, Oroquieta, and Tayabas.

Other workshop topics included Inclusive Climate Action (ICA) for Butuan City & IGACOS; and Local Energy Efficiency and Conservation Plan (LEECP) for Carmona, La Carlota, Oroquieta, and Tayabas. Meanwhile, Balanga and Calapan were trained in developing Climate and Disaster Risk Assessments (CDRA). 

The workshop topics for each city were decided based on the city’s specific needs.

Earlier this year, WWF-Philippines reported that the 2025-2026 cycle of the OPC program in the Philippines has the highest-ever number of participating cities since the program’s inception in the country 10 years ago.

In 2026, for the second half of the cycle, ICLEI SEA will also assist WWF-Philippines in providing localized feedback reports for each city.