Habitat III Timeline of Events
March 16th
The City We Need
Final proposal submitted for approval
March 16th -18th
Regional meeting: Europe
Prague, Czech Republic
March 19th
General Assembly of Partners Meeting
Prague, Czech Republic
April 4th-5th
Thematic meeting: Public space
Barcelona, Spain
April 7-8th
Thematic meeting: Informal settlements
Pretoria, South Africa
April 18th-20th
Regional meeting: LAC
Toluca, Mexico
April 25th-29th
Open-ended Informal Consultative Meetings
New York
Early May
New Urban Agenda ‘Zero draft’ document due
May 16th - 117th
Local Authorities Informal Hearings
New York
June 6th - 7th
Civil Society Informal Hearings
New York
July 11th - 20th
SDG High-Level Political Forum, first review of implementation of SDGs
New York
July (TBD)
General Assembly of Partners meeting
Jakarta
July 25th - 27th
Third meeting of the Habitat III Preparatory Committee
Surabaya, Indonesia
October (TBD)
General Assembly of Partners meeting
Quito, Ecuador
October 17th - 20th
Habitat III conference
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It has been a busy spring, as preparations continue for the upcoming Habitat III conference taking place in Quito, Ecuador in October of this year. The planning and engagement of such a significant conference is immense, and has been made significantly more complex by the tremendous and positive efforts to enable civil society and non-state actors to have a meaningful say in the process.
- The City We Need 2.0. This document sets out a vision of the city of the future and has been drafted by a sub-committee of the World Urban Campaign, including IHC. It incorporates a year’s worth of “Urban Thinker’s Campuses,” events hosted by WUC members focusing on a variety of topics related to cities and urbanization, each of which made recommendations to WUC. The TCWN 2.0 paper distills the lessons learned from all 26 UTCs and has crafted recommendations for a “new urban paradigm for the 21st century.” It consists of 10 principles of a successful and thriving city, as well as 10 drivers of change that will affect the success of the 10 principles. The document recognizes the central role that adequate housing, land rights and equitable delivery of services play in ensuring the creation of inclusive and sustainable cities, among other elements. The steering committee of the World Urban Campaign is meeting today March 16th in Prague where it is likely to officially adopt the TCWN2.0 document. If it is adopted as expected, TCWN 2.0 will represent the formal input from the World Urban Campaign into the General Assembly of Partners and the New Urban Agenda, which will be an outcome of Habitat III. Read the draft document here.
- General Assembly of Partners: Partnerships for the New Urban Agenda. The GAP, a temporary working group of the World Urban Campaign, was created with the hope that a unified civil society voice going into Habitat III would help amplify its voice in a conference that is ultimately in the hands of national governments. The GAP will be debuting this week its framework of recommendations focusing on “the day after” Habitat III and how any agreements or global targets might be operationalized and implemented. The document recommends the creation of four new bodies: (1) an Intergovernmental Panel on Sustainable Urbanization, (2) a United Nations Advisory Committee on Sustainable Urbanization, (3) a Partners Lab for Urban Sustainability and (4) a Partners’ Dashboard for Sustainable Urbanization. The first two bodies would be focused on UN institutions and ensuring continued global leadership on cities. The latter two would harness the implementing power of donors, the private sector and civil society, and attempt to create more robust and meaningful partnerships and learning across sectors. Read more about the Gap document here.