ECOSOC President’s address on Governance and Planning in WUF11

NEW DELHI: Collen Vixen Kelapile, President of the Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC), addressed a session in the 11^th edition of World Urban Forum (WUF), on June 29, titled “Integrated Governance in Spatial Planning for a more Just, Green and Healthy Urban Future”.  The President stressed on governance, planning and housing inequality in his address.

The 11^th edition of WUF, is hosted by Katowice, Poland. It is a conference which started on June 26, and will conclude on Thursday, June 30. At the conference, participants from around the globe come together to discuss the challenges which has already arisen and the challenges that may arise in the future. Additionally, the conference also discusses how to make the development of urban spaces inclusive, accessible and sustainable.

Kelapile addressed a session at the conference titled, “Integrated Governance in Spatial Planning for a more Just, Green and Healthy Urban Future”. In his address, the president highlighted the growing inequality in the world, especially in the housing sector. Kelapile, in his statement, said, “75 per cent of the cities today have higher levels of social inequality. On one hand, one billion people live in informal settlements, on another, 600 million people live in inadequate housing globally. With this, we need collaborative actions and scale for urban areas in order to respond to triple Cs… crisis that is Covid, Climate and Conflict.”

Marcela Villarreal, Director, Partnerships and UN Collaboration Division, Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), also addressed the session, where she highlighted the increasing global food demand and newly arisen hurdles that pose a greater threat to the global food security. These hurdles comprises of supply chain disruption, conflict in Ukraine, inequality of food consumption and increasing food wastage. She said, “70 per cent of the food is consumed by cities”. Also, cities far exceed the rural areas when it comes to food wastage.

Sertac Erten, Urban Planner, Arup; Mohamed Nada, Senior Urban Specialist, World Bank; Bachir Kanoute, Executive Director Enda ECOPOP Coordinator, Africa of the International  Observatory for Participatory Democracy (IOPD Africa); Gregory Scruggs, Urban Journalist; Carmen Lilia Canturosas Villarreal, Mayor of Nuevo Laredo, Government of Mexico and Ana Marina Ramos Jiménez, Vice-president, National Institute of Territorial Planning and Urbanism (INOTU); were some of the other participant speakers in the session.