Urbanisation has created gender and class-differentiated impacts. UN-Habitat seeks to support city, regional and national authorities to implement improved urban planning policies and strategies that will promote inclusive and equitable economic development; enhance municipal finances; and support the creation of decent jobs and livelihoods, particularly for youth and women.

Ten principles can be followed to produce the sort of equal post-conflict settlement planning that can help to build communities that have a better basis of becoming peaceful and sustainable. These are:

1. Gender factors should be integrated in post-conflict settlement planning.
2. Post-conflict settlement planning should increase the safety and security of all groups.
3. Women grassroots organizations should be involved in post-conflict settlement planning.
4. A spatial framework should be used to facilitate the improvement of gender-sensitive coordination of post-crisis settlement planning.
5. The planning process should be people-centred and include both women and men.
6. Planning should be about building back better and increasing crisis resilience, peace and the inclusiveness of all groups.
7. Spatial planning should frame interventions as first steps towards socially, politically and economically equal neighborhoods and cities.
8. Planning should be integrated, linking infrastructure, services and livelihoods in a way that recognizes both women and men needs.
9. Planning should generate economic recovery and growth if addressed equally.
10. Planning should be monitored and evaluated.

In many cities women and girls face violence not only in their homes and in relationships, but also in public spaces due to poor urban design and poor management of public spaces. Whether it is due to threats, intimidation, harassment, sexual attacks or rape, all aggression seriously inhibits women from moving around the city because they feel unsafe. Women and girls are often targets of violence due to their vulnerability, and this vulnerability perpetuates their position in society.

One of the ways in which women can feel safer and fully benefit from the services and resources cities can offer is to actively seek changes in their physical environment by working together with municipal authorities and other community institutions and groups. The Women's Safety Audit is a tool that enables a critical evaluation of the urban environment.

The Women's Safety Audit tool was first developed in Canada following the recommendations of the 1989 report on violence against women and has further been developed by UN-HABITAT in the cities of Cape Town, Johannesburg, Durban, Dar es Salaam, Abidjan, Nairobi and Warsaw.

Women are at risk of violence both in public and private spheres, in and around the home, in neighbourhoods and at city level. Risk is infl uenced by urban design choices and the organisation of public services including transport and energy, amongst other things. Women experience a higher degree of insecurity which can restrict their access and use of the city. UN-HABITAT supports sustainability and inclusiveness in our cities.But women and girls still experience a higher degree of insecurity as compared to men and boys, which limits their access to city services.

To create inclusive cities that respect the rights of everyone, we need to create conditions and physical environments where women, men, girls and boys can live, work, go to school, move around, and socialise without fear of harm. We also need to change attitudes and policies that perpetuate violence against women. This is essential for economic and social development and for meeting the Millennium Development Goal commitments entered into by the international community in 2000.

Towns and cities are increasingly important places for tackling gender inequalities. This book highlights some of the key gender issues we face in the context of rapid urbanisation in the developing world. It also provides an overview of UN-HABITAT’s work in promoting gender equality in all its activities and programmes.

Creating equal opportunities and protecting rights for both women and men contributes to better living conditions for the urban poor and achievement of the Millennium development goals.

La promoción de la igualdad de género y el empoderamiento de las mujeres es la tercera de los ocho Objetivos de Desarrollo del Milenio consensuadas por la comunidad mundial en el año 2000, a fin de hacer frente a los desafíos sobrecogedores de principios de este siglo 21.

A medida que las poblaciones se tornan cada vez más urbanas en todo el mundo, este tercer Objetivo es también vital para la expansión sostenible de pueblos y ciudades.

This Report is a synthesis report of the participatory and Rapid Gender Assessment (RGA) Reports that were conducted in the 17 cities of the Water for African Cities (WAC) II Programme. They represent the first stage of the Gender Mainstreaming Strategy Initiative of the WAC.

This training package provides an introduction to the important, complex, and sometimes daunting theme of improving land governance as a means to enhance gender equality and grassroots participation in land matters. This training package is designed for professionals, working in the field of land, governance, grassroots participation and gender in public institutions or civil society organizations.

The goal of the training is to improve women's land and property rights and promote the participation of grassroots communities in land processes. The focus is on gender equality and grassroots participation as vital dimensions of good land governance. The training package is prepared in two volumes: Trainee's Handbook: Readers and References and; Trainer's Guide and Training Tools.

Training providers and other stakeholders interested in carrying out the training course are encouraged to fully utilize the package and implement it as set out in these two volumes.

It cannot be assumed that women and men benefit in the same way from initiatives in the land sector. Depending on the political, economic and cultural context, it is often women, and particularly poor women, who face significant barriers in obtaining land.

The Gender Evaluation Criteria has been developed as a practical tool to systematically measure the impact of land tools and interventions on women and men, so that one has concrete evidence on their gender dimensions.

This training course on "Designing and evaluating land tools with a gender perspective" has been developed as a complementary package to the Gender Evaluation Criteria, in order to build capacity around how to apply the criteria in practice. It has been designed specifically to enable land professionals to independently use the criteria in their work.

This report surveys research and policy in the field of gender and economic development, with particular emphasis on economic literature and practice. The begins with a history of gender and economic development thought, and includes a statistical overview of women and men in developing economies, covering data on employment, Millennium Development Goals, and composite indices of gender equality. 

The report is mainly based on an analytical framework for applying gender and economic development concepts to policy by linking production relations in the household to macroeconomy. The household model, it emphasizes how gender structures the conditions of provisioning and the consequences for women's empowerment and human capabilities. It contrasts standard economic approaches to macroeconomy with one that reflects how meso-level institutions like markets or the public sector are themselves "bearers of gender", explicitly incorporating the production of human capabilities in the domestic sector.

It applies this framework to a survey of current gender and economic development issues, including globalization, liberalization and women's empowerment, the gendered terrain of central bank policy, the relationship between gender equality and economic growth, and the macroeconomics of economic development and care.