Climate and resilience

"Sustainable urbanization is the key to the wellbeing of our citizens" Paul Kagame, President of Rwanda​.

"Cities and other urban areas should be taken into account when setting future development goals" Angelino Garzon, Vice-president of Colombia.

"Urbanization cannot be seen as a demographic phenomenon, but as a transformative force shaping societies" Joan Clos, Executive Director of UN Habitat.

Members of the Global Taskforce gathered at the UN Headquarters in New York for the Integration Segment of ECOSOC 2014 have released their joint messages "Towards achieving Sustainable Cities and Human Settlements and localizing the Post-2015 Agenda", on the eve of the debates with Member States.

Taking advantage of the presence of many of the networks in Brussels for the Cities of Tomorrow Conference, the Global Taskforce will hold a meeting in Brussels on18 and 19 February at CEMR offices (CCRE-CEMR: 1 Square de Meeûs; B - 1000 Brussels).

The aim of the meeting will be to discuss content of the key agenda topics. Share a calendar of activities and define distribution of tasks for the months ahead.

The seventh session of the UN General Assembly's Open Working Group (OWG) came to an end after five days of discussion among member states, UN representatives and partners.

The Group is charged with the definition of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and this session was of particular importance for the agenda of local and international authorities as two days were dedicated to sustainable cities and human settlements as well as other topics strongly related to our work, such as transportation and risk management.

The 2013 Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM), held in Colombo, 15-17 November,  formally recognised the role which developmental local government can play in enhancing the exercise of democratic governance and in the defining and delivery of essential services as well as in promoting economic development. Commonwealth leaders also endorsed local government’s role in the post-2015 Development Agenda as set out in the outcomes of the recent Commonwealth Local Government Forum (CLGF)