HIC @ UNHabitat Executive Board
During the second session of the Executive Board of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme 2021 (15–16 November), Habitat International Coalition (HIC) presented an oral intervention, addressing three agenda items as follows:
Under Agenda Item 3 (Reports by the chairs of the ad hoc working groups), HIC encourages UN-Habitat and its organs to develop with partners an appropriate stakeholder-engagement policy, operation and the corresponding self-organized mechanism as promised at the first Assembly. HIC kept its promise there to review stakeholder-engagement practices across the UN System propose options in time for the 10th World Urban Forum (2020).
Therefore, we urge the relevant Ad Hoc Committee to focus on this important missing link to build the needed infrastructure for meaningful partnership.
Regarding Agenda Item 7 (Normative and operational activities of UN-Habitat, including reporting on the programmatic activities of the Programme in 2021 and the implementation of subprogrammes, flagship programmes and technical cooperation activities, and an update on the response of the Programme to the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic), HIC commends UN-Habitat’s efforts to develop ‘flagship products’ that facilitate integrated normative and operative NUA implementation. Welcome is the Global Urban Monitoring Framework under development, beyond the piecemeal campaigns of the past. Coherent with the normative dimension also, that tool incorporates the international law definition of adequate housing, and would still benefit from including the human rights criteria for lawful eviction, aligned with states’ prior treaty performance and reporting obligations.
On Agenda Item 8 (High-level meeting to assess progress in the implementation of the New Urban Agenda). The NUA pledges complement and offer greater specificity to these binding obligations and the voluntary commitments, and proffer important guidance for UN-Habitat and all spheres of government. We look forward to more implementation and reporting by states, as well as improved guidance for state reporting, including such innovative and timely pledges as state support for ‘social production of housing and habitat’ and realizing the ‘social and ecological functions of land.’
See HIC’s formal written submission to the Executive Board meeting.
Photo: UN-Habitat Executive Director Maimunah Mohd Sharif addresses the plenary session of the 2nd Executive Board session, November 2021. Source: UN-Habitat.
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