UN-Habitat supports cities and countries all over the world to strengthen governance by improving the coordination and transparency of institutional frameworks; empowering representatives of urban stakeholders and constituencies through inclusive sound institutions and mechanisms; and providing predictability and coherence in urban development plans to enable social inclusion, sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, and environmental protection. The rationale being that the…

This is the third edition of UN-Habitat’s Policy, Legislation and Governance Section Annual Report. The report demonstrates the Section’s position within UN-Habitat’s strategic context, and also links this area of work to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the New Urban Agenda. The report provides insights into our initiatives and collaborative efforts with all our partners, and presents progress made and results achieved in 2022. It presents these achievements along four focus areas…

The Digital Rights Governance Project in Europe aimed at supporting cities to develop capacity and engage people to mainstream this human rights-based approach, by providing both normative and practical guidance to ensure that the human rights mechanisms that are in place offline are also in place online. This report summarises learnings from the project and pilots in the City of Brussels, Dublin, Tirana and Sofia and tools to operationalise the guidance in cities.

The current report shows that the world is off track in achieving SDG 11. Rescuing SDG 11 is urgent for the sake of present and future generations. The report points to the immense opportunities that exist and the innovations that are already underway.

The report was prepared by UN-Habitat as a lead coordinator, with inputs from several UN custodian agencies, other UN entities, civil society, academia, United Cities and Local Governments, and various other stakeholders and…

This study identifies formal and nonformal land professionals’ categories, their current functions and the additional roles that they would need to take up to improve land governance and establish functioning and fit-for-purpose land administration systems in the Arab region. The study highlights the common challenges faced by land professionals and takes stock of their current capacities, the additional capacities they would need, and the interventions that would enable them to adequately play…

The UN-Habitat Regional Office for the Arab States, located in Cairo, supports 18 countries in the region to promote socially and environmentally sustainable cities. In a rapidly urbanising region, UN-Habitat envisions well-planned and well-governed cities through focusing on adequate housing, urban recovery, access to basic services, public spaces, policy and governance, housing, land and property rights, localisation of the Sustainable Development Goals and climate action.

This second mission of UN-Habitat was deployed to Ukraine to prepare for the upcoming launch of UN-Habitat’s activities in the country, in line with the requests from its Executive Board (March 2022) and a request from the government of Ukraine (July 2022). It allowed the team to address a number of issues that required clarification before the establishment of UN-Habitat in Ukraine.

In June 2022, in follow-up to the report by the High-Level Panel on Internal Displacement, the United Nations Secretary-General launched his Action Agenda on Internal Displacement. The Action Agenda calls for the UN family to step up its efforts to advance solutions at scale to internal displacement, prevent future displacement crises from emerging, and strengthen the quality of protection and assistance provided to those who are already displaced.

Building resilience must be at the core of planning and designing our cities. Aligned with the Philippine New Urban Agenda vision “Better, Greener, Smarter Cities in an Inclusive Philippines”, this guide provides a platform to equip users with concepts and technical information on urban planning and design for climate resilience. It aims to deliver guidance for national government agencies, local government units, and other stakeholders in pursuing resilient and sustainable development. This…