Sustainable, Inclusive and Evidence-based National Urban Policy ? Regional and Country Experience

Over the recent years, it has been widely recognized that in order to capitalize on the opportunities presented by urbanization, urban policy and planning must embrace a scope that reaches beyond the traditional city.

Managing this change in a sustainable and equitable manner will inevitably require a broader approach to urban planning and policy and a higher level of vertical and horizontal coordination in the form of national level guidance.

This event aims to share experience of different countries in their process to develop their National Urban Policies (NUP) which should contribute to strengthening capacities of policy makers at country and city levels for more safe, sustainable and inclusive cities and human settlements applying a participatory and inclusive approach, which should rally multiple stakeholders (governments, professionals, academia and CSOs) to collectively define a common urban vision. NUP should facilitate the role of cities in the transformation of the national economy by providing a coordinating framework and action plan to bring coherence across various urban sectors and scales of urban management. The event will increase awareness of countries about tools and best practices in NUP making and provide platforms for interactions.

These countries shall share their experience on the different stages of the policy formulation cycle (feasibility, diagnosis, formulation, implementation, monitoring and evaluation). It is a timely demonstration of actions that development partners and countries can take to support the implementation of the New Urban Agenda and the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda.

This initiative comes in line with the New Urban Agenda that to take measures to establish legal and policy frameworks, based on the principles of equality and non-discrimination, to better enable prevailing governments to effectively implement national urban policies, as appropriate, and to empower them as policy and decision-makers, ensuring appropriate fiscal, political, and administrative decentralization based on the principle of subsidiary.