Nairobi, 25 April 2017--UN-Habitat, Placemakers, the Project for Public Spaces and the International New Town Institute are organising an Urban Thinkers Campus event on the topic of the 'city we need' and its relationhip to safe, inclusive and accessible public spaces, at the UN Nairobi compound, 3-4 May 2017. The Urban Thinkers Campus will focus on the implementation of public spaces through participatory urban processes, like placemaking. Good quality public spaces are excellent starting points for improving the standards of urban life for all citizens.

Urban India is currently facing a wide gap between the demand and supply of housing, not only in terms of quantity but also in terms of quality. The Ministry of Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation (MoHUPA) currently estimates the urban housing shortage at 18.78 million units, more than 95 per cent of which pertains to homes for low-income groups.

19 April, Nairobi - Plan International recently launched their programme ‘Safer Cities for Girls’ in Kenya with the help of UN-Habitat.

Chengdu, 13 April 2017 – UN-Habitat and UN-Environment, in collaboration with the Chengdu Municipal People’s Government, have started working on an assessment of the development plans for the city’s Greenbelt and Shaocheng District.

Turkana – 12 April 2017. In 2016 UN-Habitat, supported by the Japanese government, began working on developing a Local Advisory Spatial Plan for the new KALOBEYEI Settlement. This was in close collaboration with UNHCR, Ministry of Land, Shelter and Urban Development and through participatory processes including workshops, focus groups and participatory meetings with the host and refugee commuters.

New York, 10 March 2017 - At the 61st session of the Commission on the Status of Women in New York (13-24 March 2017), the Deputy Secretary General of the United Nations, Ms Amina Mohamed and other keynote speakers, reaffirmed the catalytic role that women and girls play in development. Importantly, the Deputy Secretary General and other speakers called for participatory approaches, such as slum upgrading, to be used as tools to deliver the sustainable development goals, especially urban goal 11 “making cities inclusive” as well as the New Urban Agenda.

Nairobi - March 27 2017, UN-Habitat in collaboration with the County Government of Kiambu and the Institute of Development Studies, University of Nairobi organized a workshop to disseminate the process and outcomes of the “Sustainable Urban Mobility Plan” initiative, recently concluded in Ruiru, one of the towns within the Nairobi Metropolitan Area.

Berlin – 5 April 2017. The first Capacity Development based on the UN-Habitat MetroHUB methodology was held in Berlin, Germany for 19 Ugandan government officials.  The capacity development and learning exchange visit to Berlin was a tailor made programme for the participants from 14 Ugandan municipalities and the Uganda Ministry for Urban Development.  The Ugandan Minister of State for Urban Development, Hon. Isaac Isanga Musumba, also took part in the Capacity Development, linking the projects and presentations to national and presidential priorities.

New York, 29 March 2017 – At the recent 61st Commission on the Status of Women, UN-Habitat hosted a series of multi-stakeholder events at the UN Headquarters to make certain that the role of women in the implementation of the New Urban Agenda is well understood and the realization of inclusive, economically viable and sustainable cities is achieved.

Drawing from its extensive experience in building inclusive governance capacity, promoting adequate housing, and improvement of living standards for people living in slums through implementing slum upgrading projects, UN-Habitat has consolidated an integrated, in-situ citywide approach to slum upgrading and prevention in its Participatory Slum Upgrading Programme (PSUP).