At the Habitat III Conference in Quito, the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) presented a regional report on major urbanization trends in the region and expressed its commitment to supporting countries in the implementation of the New Urban Agenda, according to declarations by Executive Secretary Alicia Bárcena, who spoke at an event organized by the five United Nations regional commissions and attended by the mayors of Mexico City and Surabaya (Indonesia).
“The United Nations Regional Commissions played an important role in the preparation of Habitat III by coordinating, along with the UN-Habitat regional offices, the regional reports that served as inputs for the New Urban Agenda to be adopted in Quito,” said the Executive Secretary at the side event held during the United Nations Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development, which is taking place from 17 to 20 October.
The event was attended by Joan Clos, Secretary General of Habitat III and Kumaresh Misra, Deputy Secretary General; Miguel Ángel Mancera, Mayor of Mexico City; Tri Rismaharini, Mayor of Surabaya (Indonesia); Jean Pierre Mbassi, Secretary General of the United Cities and Local Governments of Africa (UCLGA); and Shin-pei Tsay, Executive Director of the Gehl Institute (United States). A statement by Ahmad Hamad AL-Subih, Secretary General of the Arab Towns Organization, was also read out at the event.
Other speakers at the event were Christian Friis, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE); Rima Khalaf, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia (ESCWA); Shamshad Akhtar, Executive Secretary of the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP); and Takyiwaa Manuh, Director of the Social Development Policy Division of the Economic Commission for Africa (ECA).
“The regional commissions are committed to supporting Member States and other regional actors in the implementation and follow-up of global agreements, especially the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the New Urban Agenda. For this purpose, our region has established the new Forum of the Countries of Latin America and the Caribbean on Sustainable Development, which will hold its first meeting in April 2017 in Mexico,” said Bárcena.
“One of the central themes is urban financing and the full participation of mayors in an agenda that has, until now, been the domain of central governments,” she added.
At this event, ECLAC presented a document with six key messages summarizing the main content of the regional report, as an input for the New Urban Agenda that will be adopted at Habitat III and will to guide the efforts of all stakeholders to achieve sustainable urban development over the next two decades.
First, the publication highlights that in Latin America and the Caribbean, with 79.5% of the population located in urban areas, the central challenge is no longer the need to address the problems associated with rural-urban transition, but is rather about improving the quality of life in cities, closing the gaps generated by inequality and achieving sustainable outcomes. Thus, a new urban agenda for sustainable development is fundamental for the future of the region.
Moreover, the region is marked by a double urban-demographic transition, given the decreasing rates of rural-urban migration and population growth, and the process of population ageing. The ECLAC document also points to a high concentration of economic, demographic and administrative activities in a small number of large metropolitan areas.
Nonetheless, the benefits that cities can offer for promoting development, such as economies of agglomeration and scale, the proximity of the factors of production and the exchange of ideas and innovation, are limited by negative externalities associated with an urban growth that is guided by weak planning and the region’s structural challenges, such as low productivity, informality and lack of investment in infrastructure and knowledge economies. This hinders economic inclusion and universal access to the benefits of urban development.
In this respect, ECLAC emphasizes that the countries of the region have made significant advances in reducing the quantitative housing deficit and urban informal settlements. For example, the percentage of the population living in slums dropped from 25.5% in 2005 to 21.2% in 2014. Nonetheless, inequality, socioeconomic residential segregation and public safety continue to pose challenges.
The report also points out that the region is highly vulnerable to the effects of climate change, particularly in Central America and the Caribbean, and this phenomenon has unequal socio-territorial impacts. At the same time, urban growth has also increased environmental problems because of the pressures exerted by patterns of production, distribution and private consumption.
Lastly, the document indicates that significant progress has been made in recognizing the city as a macro-level public good, but institutional weaknesses persist with regard to the management of public services, coordination and assignation of responsibilities, data collection capacity and urban financing.
