Summary
On Friday, 29 April, the Habitat III Open-Ended Informal Consultative Meetings entered its final day at UN Headquarters in New York. The day was organized around the issue of “Enhancing the Means of Implementation: follow-up and review.”
In the morning, two panels took place under the theme “Enhancing financing and means of implementation,” namely: “Municipal finance and local fiscal systems” and “Financing urban development.” On the first panel, panelists explored the outcomes of Policy Unit 5, including around: devolution of authority to collect local-level taxes; flexibility to adopt the right mix of revenue streams; and expansion of local revenue sources. On the second, the panel discussed the outcomes of the March 2016 thematic meeting in Mexico City, Mexico, on financing urban development. Debates focused on the need to foster fiscal decentralization, enhance public-private partnerships and effectively combat land speculation.
In the afternoon, the meeting discussed follow-up and review of the New Urban Agenda and considered outcomes of the session. In the closing session, Joan Clos, Under-Secretary General of Habitat III, stressed the importance of urbanization for sustainable development, noting that the understanding of development has changed, as well as that of the role of urbanization in promoting prosperity.
Co-Chair Gautier thanked the lively engagement of all stakeholders and summarized key messages from the week, including that: the resource management system is necessary; urban development must take into account the protection and maintenance of cultural heritage to ensure inclusive cities; informal sectors must be taken into account during spatial planning; and that finance must be further mobilized.
The meeting was gaveled to a close at 5:03 pm.
IISD Reporting Services, through its ENB Meeting Coverage, is providing web coverage from the Habitat III Open-Ended Informal Consultative Meetings. In addition, IISD Reporting Services, has published a summary report from the meetings, which is availabe in HTML and PDF format.
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