Pact
The KIN Pact is a community in which civil society organisations, governments, business and science come together to jointly work on accelerating (climate) transitions. Pact members subscribe to the mission of the KIN and the principles of the Pact: bringing the most urgent and relevant issues to the table, sharing knowledge and above all, taking action together. As a member of the Pact you have access to a broad network from science and practice, but also to knowledge, tools and resources. The KIN is there to support members.
What is the Pact
The KIN Pact is a transdisciplinary community committed to accelerating system transitions.
The Pact connects parties and identifies and prioritises (knowledge) issues in the field of climate transitions. The Pact supports members in mutually sharing, developing and applying knowledge.
Organisations and individuals from science and practice, can join the Pact to exchange knowledge, meet each other and work together. Members do this in working groups around themes.
Who is the pact for?
The KIN Pact is for:
- Scientists
- Practical researchers
- Social institutions
- Sustainability professionals from business or government
- Policy makers
- Other interested parties working on (climate) transitions.
How do I become a member?
You can become a member by registering via the button below. Membership is free of charge. But we do ask you to draw up a pledge, because as a member you also make a pact! In your pledge, you give a short explanation of why you want to join Pact as an organisation or person. You can become a member as an individual, as a team or with your entire department, lectorate or organisation.
Do you doubt whether Pact suits you or your organisation? Contact us and we will look into it together.
What can the Pact offer you?
- Access to a broad network of science and practice.
- First access to new sources of funding.
- Attend multi-annual KIN Pact events.
- Linking your own research with the KIN programme.
- Knowledge sharing via our physical and online platforms
- Set up your own working group on a particular theme
- Help from the KIN in organising activities by the working group.
- Visibility for your research and/or organisation within the Pact and the broad KIN network.
What does membership mean?
- Action on (research into) climate change
- Members of the Pact actively contribute to the community by, for example, contributing time, resources, networks or facilities.
- Members of the Pact draw up their own pledge and sign the core values of the Pact.
- Membership of Pact is free of charge.
KIN Pact Calender 2025
June 2025
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4 June (new date!): Kickoff meeting working group 'Resilient Communities'. Time: 10.30-12.00 uur. Location: online. More info: Monique Vissers: mjgm.vissers@fontys.nl
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6 June: Online edition Community of Practice working group Knowledge for Policy. More info? Mail Community manager Rosa van den Berg R.vandenberg@nwo.nl
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18 juni: Pact-Do-it-Together Day. Location: Bouwurk, Leeuwarden. Open to registration for Pact Members. Register here.
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26 juni: Meeting Community of Practice: Working Transdisciplinary for Tranistions (NECTR). Location: University of Applied Sciences Utrecht. Register via Laura Termeer: l.termeer@hetgroenebrein.nl
Roadmap: Becoming a member of Pact
- Step 1: Apply via this form. You can apply as an individual or as a team, department or organisation.
- Step 2: Sign the Kin Pact values in the form. You will receive an instant confirmation from us.
- Step 3: We will contact you within 5 working days for a brief introduction and to confirm your membership.
- Step 4: We will then also send you the form for preparing your Pact Pledge.
- Step 5: Draft your pledge, possibly together with your team.
- Step 6: Return the pledge to us
- Step 7: Welcome to Pact! You now have access to our member environment with events, an overview of the Pact network.
Overview Pact Work Groups
New to Pact
Lawyers for a Sustainable World (JDW)
JDW brings experts together to actively contribute to a sustainable and just world. Through inspiring meetings and an accessible ESG platform, we promote knowledge sharing and awareness around climate and sustainability law. We help lawyers to think in a transition-oriented way, act as sparring partners and integrate sustainability into their field of work. Our activities stimulate collaboration and innovation, enabling lawyers to work with experts to develop solutions that accelerate the transition. By strengthening networks and partnerships with legal and non-legal parties, we increase our impact. In this way, we are building a powerful legal community that puts sustainability at the heart of policy and practice.
New to Pact
Climate-resilient sandy soil network: Connecting research and practice
The climate-resilient sandy soils network aims to connect academic knowledge and facilitate its transfer to practice. We strive for an open and broadly accessible transdisciplinary network in which knowledge and experiences are shared and new initiatives arise. The ultimate goal of the collaboration is to stimulate and accelerate system transitions in rural areas. The first steps the network wants to take within the KIN Pact are to organise an initial national meeting, set up an organisational structure and secure structural funding, and set up an online portal to make ongoing research projects accessible.
New to Pact
Het KANNN
KANNN is the knowledge and innovation network for companies that have participated in the Koploper projects: a one-year programme that supports entrepreneurs in becoming more sustainable. We connect companies and educational institutions to solve sustainability issues and share knowledge. We do this through workshops, knowledge sessions and a helpdesk that translates business challenges into student assignments and research projects. Our network focuses on broad sustainability themes, including climate transition, and contributes to systemic change. We accelerate innovation through collaboration and research. Within the KIN Pact, we want to further professionalise and scale up our activities.
New to Pact
Materials Security and the Climate Transition Network
Critical raw materials are vital for technologies and infrastructure for the climate transition, but the supply chain faces risks due to geopolitical, ecological and economic pressures. The Critical Raw Materials Act sets clear supply targets
, but achieving them is a major challenge. The mission of the Materials Security and Climate Transition Network
is therefore to connect science, policy and society to build a strong materials ecosystem that supports climate goals and reduces external dependencies. To tackle these complex issues, we take a holistic view and approach – no single actor can solve this alone.
New to Pact
Network of Accessible* Food Communities
A sustainable food system is crucial to effectively tackle the climate and environmental crisis. However, local, healthy and organic food is currently inaccessible to many people. This needs to change. A small group of initiatives is already working hard to make food communities accessible. The Accessible Food Communities Network brings these frontrunners together in a Community of Practice, where knowledge and experiences are shared. The network offers practical guidance to gardeners, community members and policymakers through meetings and a knowledge product. Leiden University, transition agency Squarewise and three motivated initiatives are at the start of this network.
New to Pact
National Expertise Centre for TRansdisciplinary Working (NECTR)
The Netherlands has a wealth of transdisciplinary knowledge and experience. This expertise is spread across various organisations, initiatives and sectors. This lack of cohesion hinders the ability to learn from each other’s insights and realise impactful applications. The National Expertise Centre for Transdisciplinary Working (NECTR) offers a professionalisation network, knowledge mobilisation and competence development. This enables us to increase the social and scientific impact of transdisciplinary working and contribute to societal transitions. In addition to the applicants, parties such as AMS, Athena, Convergence, EWUU, Rathenau, RVO and TUDelft-FRAIM have now also joined the network. With this network grant, we can strengthen and open up NECTR through an online platform, communication and events.
New to Pact
Indigenous Liberation Month x Just Transitions Network
Indigenous Liberation Month x Just Transitions Network provides a platform for Indigenous peoples, academics, engineers and other stakeholders to highlight the importance of Indigenous knowledge systems, values and perspectives in the just transition, particularly in the context of the transition to green energy. Through a series of events, we will explore challenges and opportunities related to resource extraction, technology and indigenous knowledge systems, including visions for social and technological innovations. Our network aims to highlight and support the leadership, voice and capacity-building of indigenous peoples in navigating the challenges of just transitions, while encouraging stakeholders to join our mission.
New to Pact
Right for Climate Foundation
Law for Climate is a legal movement with more than 400 participants. We are committed to the transition to a new legal ‘business as usual’ that respects planetary boundaries.
Within the foundation, committees are active that focus on bottlenecks in specific areas of law. Such as procurement law, labour law or environmental law. The committees aim to resolve bottlenecks by approaching them from different perspectives and areas of expertise, including academic, administrative, legal and business. Participants are not exclusively lawyers: regulators, civil servants, politicians, economists and other experts also join in to arrive at integrated solutions.
New to Pact
HitteLab Rotterdam: heat and health
The HitteLab Rotterdam is a learning community focused on (urban) heat. Through the HitteLab, we – Rotterdam’s knowledge institutions, the Municipal Health Service (GGD) and the Municipality of Rotterdam – are increasingly pooling our (field lab/measurement) infrastructures, research projects and partnerships. In this way, we aim to establish an accessible, reciprocal and structural way of collaborating, researching and exchanging knowledge on heat-related issues in Rotterdam. These issues affect the health of residents, buildings and public spaces. The basis of the HeatLab is a transdisciplinary (graduation) workshop that addresses issues from local practice. Under the supervision of the graduation projects, we are building a learning community where policy, research and practice continuously come together.
Lifeport Metalab
Lifeport Metalab is a new cooperation network for climate transition research in the Green Arnhem-Nijmegen Metropolitan Region. Metalab coordinates applied research into transition issues of companies, governments and citizens. Together with practical partners, the metalab makes an inventory of important transition issues and draws up a research agenda. Based on practical questions, the metalab approaches researchers from regional knowledge institutions, forms research teams with them and looks for research funding with the consortia. The research results are also shared through the metalab with other companies, and networks in the region. In cooperation with existing networks, the metalab therefore also organises knowledge sharing on this in the region.
The Car Free City
The network behind ‘The Car Free City’, is developing a new narrative and toolbox to support car-free measures. It creates awareness about car-dominant streets and provides resources for dialogue with residents and businesses. Policymakers and councillors are provided with solutions to resistance to parking policies, such as paid parking and fewer parking spaces. The plan aims to break polarisation and shift the focus to liveability. Together with experts and residents, new strategies are developed. The end result is a blueprint for municipalities to better involve residents in sustainable mobility and urban improvements.
Art and Science - 'Warming up on Tour'
Around the international climate summit (COP) in November 2025, climate is in the spotlight in every province with ‘Warming Up on Tour’. The working group matches an artist and a scientist who work together to make a local climate story tangible and palpable and present it a local culture house. All these climate stories together form The (Climate) Story of the Netherlands. Warming Up on Tour is a research project with a concrete outcome, exploring, monitoring and reflecting on different ways of collaboration between scientists and artists. The working group develops the concept, the method and the formation of the duos.
Just Energy Alliance
The Alliance for a Just Energy Transition is committed to a transition in which the (policy) development and implementation of technological measures go hand in hand with a social approach. The Alliance connects the different perspectives of scientists, companies, policymakers, civil society organisations and residents (initiatives) in various assemblies. Through open dialogue, co-creation and knowledge sharing (from literature and practice), barriers are identified and integrated solutions are developed. By connecting these fragmented perspectives, climate action is consistently linked to issues such as poverty reduction, health improvement and social inclusion. The Alliance thus contributes to a structurally different (equal) way of working together for a (more) Just Energy Transition.
Network Transformative Advice (NTA)
Consultants play a crucial role in the transition to a climate-neutral and climate-resilient society. They connect actors, facilitate cooperation and develop and disseminate knowledge with and for practitioners. Demand for these transition intermediaries is growing, but their potential remains underused and the sector is also regularly under criticism. The Transformative Advice network therefore brings together organisations that want to take the role of advice in transitions to the next level. The network aims to work with key stakeholders from science and practice to create a sector that co-develops transformative knowledge, disseminates it widely, and translates it into action.
Alliance for Future-proof Food Systems
The Alliance for Future-proof Food Systems aims to connect and develop a number of food transition-focused networks into a transition community with scientists (both academic and practitioner research), civil society organisations and practitioners. Building on the experiences, knowledge and networks of a number of organisations, this Alliance aims to act as a widely accessible knowledge coalition working on complex food transition issues and the necessary institutional changes from a transdisciplinary systems approach, with the underlying mission of accelerating the agriculture and food transition.
Learning community Climate Psychology in Primary Education
How can you discuss climate issues in primary education by addressing them from a hopeful, action-oriented perspective without trivializing them? The Climate Psychology Learning Community in Primary Education has been formed around this question. The reason for the network parties to join forces is the desire to create a children’s book about climate emotions and climate justice. Although there is already research on young adults, the various disciplines do not yet have the knowledge needed to write such a book for a younger target group. Setting up a knowledge and research network is therefore essential to fill the current knowledge gap on climate emotions among a younger target group.
Teaching about climate change in secundary education
Climate change is one of society’s biggest challenges, but receives limited attention within current secondary education (VO) curricula. Many teachers do not have the
time or expertise to design well-founded climate education themselves. Within this project, the aim is to develop an online platform where we unlock Dutch teaching materials on climate change – tested on scientific knowledge (from climate research and related disciplines) and professional didactic
knowledge – and link them to the core objectives and examination programmes. By offering both short lesson additions, full lessons (series) and didactic support, we make it easy for teachers to embed climate as a theme in their teaching.
Climate Obstruction NL - ‘What opposing forces stand in the way of the transition to a sustainable energy system?’
It is crucial to overcome the structural and strategic counterforces that effectively stand in the way of effective climate policy and system transitions. The KIN working group ‘which opposing forces stand in the way of climate transition?’ brings together misinformation experts, climate obstruction researchers, policy makers, NGOs, creative professionals, journalists and other relevant actors to develop projects that tackle specific forms of climate obstruction. Our first activities are to organise training sessions for journalists and a briefing for members of the Dutch parliament, in which we will specifically focus on climate misinformation. How do you recognise misinformation and how do you deal with it? How do you ensure that you do not unknowingly spread misinformation or draw attention to it?
Citizen science: sustainable cooperation in transdisciplinary learning communities
The Dutch Caribbean islands are being hit hard by climate change, and the impact will only increase for future generations. That is why this network is focusing on making cooperation between knowledge and social institutions more sustainable, in order to increase climate awareness and involvement among local young people. The climate is complex and requires a transdisciplinary approach that connects the global with the local. This is evident in the Sustainable Environments Curaçao (SEC) Learning Community, which involves Delft University of Technology, The Hague University of Applied Sciences, the University of Curaçao and social partners. Together, they create knowledge and use citizen science to pass this knowledge on to new generations.
Resilient communities
Communities such as neighbourhoods, districts or small towns that want to work consciously to increase their resilience can come to us. Ecovillages around the world have collaborated to gain insight into how communities can increase their resilience in order to be prepared for climate change, among other things. See Ecovillage Resilience Research. In this working group, we want to make this knowledge easily available and applicable. One example is an emergency radio that also works when the power goes out. We have already developed tools for this, such as Resilience Tracker. We also offer knowledge about promoting biodiversity. We would like to work with you, citizens, policymakers, researchers, creative thinkers and makers to see how we can put this knowledge into practice even faster and better.
Transdisciplinary work for transitions
Cooperation between disciplines and between sectors to bring about the complex (climate) transitions.
How do you do that in practice? KIN and Het Groene Brein have set up a Community of Practice (CoP) to investigate this. NECTR, a new national centre for transdisciplinary work, will also be launched in early April.
Transition Analysis Flooding East Brabant
The theme ‘Water, Soil and Network Steering’ in relation to local issues is an important theme within the KIN. In dialogue with the Pact members of the KIN, among others, the urgent high-water problems in the region around Den Bosch (East Brabant) emerged as a concrete case. The intention is to arrive at a systemic transition analysis of this major issue, which also plays out more broadly in delta areas at home and abroad, especially during more extreme precipitation events.
KIN scientific figurehead Derk Loorbach, together with HAS professor of climate-robust landscapes Ellen Weerman, will set up a ‘transition lab’ for this purpose to bring together knowledge from both research and practice in this, thus contributing to truly transformative and equitable solution directions.
The chances of modular and granular solutions
Over the next two months, we will be working with experts to explore the field. What is going on, who are the problem owners and where can we, as KIN, offer added value? Currently, based on a field exploration, we are seeking cooperation with problem owners and social stakeholders, such as municipalities and provinces.
Science Policy Interface
This collaboration between KIN and Science4 Policy team (Ministry of OCW) brings together researchers and policymakers from initiatives that want to strengthen complex (climate) policy challenges with science.
Do you want to contribute to a work group?
Would you like to know more about a subject, would you like to share your expertise or is your organisation working on a similar issue that we could connect with? Email us
Are you interested or do you have any questions?
For any questions, please contact community manager Rosa van den Berg at pact@hetkin.nl.
The Pact strategy document provides a much more detailed explanation of what the KIN Pact entails, what the network and membership look like, how the organisation is structured, what the activities are, and the action plan for 2024.
Ready to become an official member? Fantastic! You can do this by signing the KIN core values and creating a pledge in which you describe your contribution to the Pact. First, fill out the registration form, and we will get back to you.
How does it work?
1) The Strategy and Advisory Board prioritises thematic areas and directs the development of the Pact. Comprising 8 – 16 members, appointed by the KIN Steering Committee.
2) Active Pact Members propose issues and organise activities. – Participation is open to employees of organisations. – Organisation within thematic working groups.
3) General Pact Members are actively involved in activities. Participation is open to organisations and individuals in a personal capacity.
Strategy and Advisory Board
- Advisory: The members advise KIN on which issues raised by societal partners should be prioritised, identifying and ranking them accordingly.
- Strategy: The members contribute to the strategic development of the Pact, for example, by offering input on how to make it as diverse, inclusive, and transparent as possible.
The current SAR consists of 10 members, each with extensive experience in various aspects of climate transitions, drawn from their diverse positions. Together, they bring a wide range of perspectives from societal aspects of climate transitions, psychology, the financial sector, water management, policy, and energy transition.
At present, the Strategy and Advisory Board includes: Linda Steg, Bregje van Weesenbeeck, Richard van de Sanden, Piet Sprengers, Olof van der Gaag, Rob Weterings, Joost Koch, Stefan Kuks, Geeke Feiter, and Lot van Hooijdonk. Learn more about their profiles and motivations in the introductory blog.
In July 2024, the SAR issued advice on the prioritisation of knowledge questions. In doing so, they set out several requirements for both the approach and the thematic focus. A visual summary and the key points of the advice are available in the blog.
Hoe werkt lid worden van het Pact?
1) De Strategie- en Adviesraad prioriteert inhoudelijke thema’s en stuurt ontwikkeling van het Pact aan. 8 – 16 personen, benoemd door KIN Stuurgroep.
2) Actieve Pact Leden dragen vraagstukken aan en organiseren activiteiten. – Deelname voor medewerkers van organisaties. – Organisatie in thematische werkgroepen
3) Algemene Pact Leden worden actief betrokken bij activiteiten. Deelname voor organisaties en individuen op persoonlijke titel.
Closure of KIN Pact Network Subsidy
Following successful first and second collection periods, the third collection period for the KIN Pact Network Subsidy has been cancelled. The reason for this is that, after the two previous collection periods, it is highly unlikely that sufficient budget will remain to open a successful third collection period
What’s in the first advice from the strategy and advisory council?
The Strategy and Advisory Council (SAR) of the KIN Pact issued its first advice on prioritising knowledge questions, which the steering group adopted. The SAR identified four key challenges: implementing Water-Soil-Network policy, adaptation versus acceptance, opportunities for modular solutions, and preventing displacement in scarcity. This advice provides direction for KIN, focusing on problem owners’ needs. Next steps include identifying problem owners and aligning with ongoing programmes. For more information, see the public summary or full appendix. Together, we aim for a climate-neutral and climate-resilient Netherlands.
KIN Pact officially launched on April 18th
With a festive launch event at the Museon-Omniversum in The Hague, the Climate Research Initiative Netherlands (KIN) Pact officially went live on Thursday, April 18th. This means that societal organizations, governments, businesses, and knowledge institutions can now join the transdisciplinary network committed to accelerating system transitions.
Wil je meer weten over het Pact?
In het Pact strategiedocument staat uitgebreid uitgelegd wat het KIN Pact inhoudt, hoe het netwerk en lidmaatschap er uit zien, hoe de organisatie in elkaar steekt, wat de activiteiten zijn en wat het actieplan voor 2024 is.
