UN must reinvigorate the cities

Nairobi: India has expressed support for the creation of UN-Urban, an outfit to coordinate the world body’s activities for urban development. Housing and Urban Affairs Ministry official Rajiv Ranjan Mishra, said: “We need to ensure that all UN agencies and also all levels within UN-Habitat work in tandem to strengthen implementation of urban agenda and sustainable development goals (SDGs).”

The meeting will discuss how the New Urban agenda has been implemented since its adoption in October 2016 at the UN Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development, known as Habitat iii, while examining the recommendations put forth by an independent panel reviewing the effectiveness of UN Habitat. It will also address the measures contained in the report of the Secretary General’s independent Panel to assess, Enhance Effectiveness of UN-Habitat after adoption of New Urban agenda, which was published at the beginning of August 2017.

Mishra, who is an additional Secretary in the Ministry, told a High Level Meeting of the General assembly on the New Urban agenda and UN Habitat, “The recommendation to strengthen UN-Habitat by establishing UN-Urban, based in New York with the purpose of identifying opportunities for collaboration across agencies and countries is welcome.”

The United Nations deputy chief said that the organization is failing to deliver sufficiently in cities, and its work in and on urban areas must be reinvigorated, as the General assembly kicked off a high-level meeting on a new UN approach to the rapidly urbanizing world.

“Today, we acknowledge that the UN is not delivering sufficiently in cities. And, through our common effort, we will rectify this,” said Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed in her opening remarks to the two-day event.

“The proud history of urban work at the UN must be harnessed at this vital time, and the UN must be seen again as the lead convener and catalyser for partners, funders, private sector and civil society organisations to scale up their work in urban areas,” she added, stressing the need for reform of the UN Human Settlements Programme (UN Habitat).

In his remarks, General assembly President Peter Thomson stressed the importance of capitalizing on the enormous social and economic opportunities provided by mass urbanisation to lift people out of poverty, drive inclusive economic growth, promote equality, strengthen community resilience, and of course, effectively combat climate change.

Secondly, strategic partnerships have to be strengthened between governments at all levels, community leaders, civil society, and the business community, to foster coherent approaches to urban development. Then there is the task of harnessing the exponential potential of science, technology and innovation to drive smart new approaches towards sustainable urbanisation and achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Mr. Thomson said.

In its report released in august, the panel convened by Secretary General Antonio Guterres, said that UN-Urban would help coordinate urban development activities across the sprawling UN establishment and promote the New Urban agenda (NUA) adopted in 2016 by the Habitat iii conference to promote the relevant UN SDGs.

Earlier, Deputy Secretary-General Amina Mohammed admitted that the UN was not doing enough for the urban areas. “Today, we acknowledge that the UN is not delivering sufficiently in cities. And, through our common effort, we will rectify this,” she said. In the Panel’s assessment, the first priority is to save, stabilize and then rapidly strengthen UN-Habitat to equip it for a renewed role based on the 2030 agenda, adopted in 2015, as well as the New Urban agenda.