2014-06-16

7th Session of the World Urban Forum (WUF-7)

The 7th Session of the World Urban Forum (WUF-7) was held 4-11 April 2014 in Medellin, Colombia. During the Forum, the WHO Kobe Centre held two networking events:

  • Health equity and sustainable urban development in the post-2015 development agenda – Second WHO-UN HABITAT joint report
  • Healthy and equitable urban planning through intersectoral action.

WHO Kobe Centre (WKC) also shared Centre’s work through the exhibition space.



The World Urban Forum is organized by the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN HABITAT) every second year. WUF is a non-legislative technical forum to examine the most pressing issues facing the world today in the area of human settlements, including rapid urbanization and its impact on cities, communities, economies, climate change and policies. WKC has closely collaborated with UN-Habitat since 2010 and shares a joint agenda of urban issues.

 

WKC sessions at the 7th World Urban Forum

At the 7th World Urban Forum, WKC organized two networking events: “Healthy and equitable urban planning through intersectoral action” and “Health equity and sustainable urban development in the post-2015 development agenda – Second WHO-UN HABITAT joint report”.

Healthy and equitable urban planning through intersectoral action

8th April 2014, 8:30-10:00, One UN Room

The session on “Healthy and equitable urban planning through intersectoral action” provided information on how to assess and respond to urban health inequity through urban planning and intersectoral cooperation. It demonstrated how urban planning can be used as a tool to promote health and health equity in cities; introduced the issue of intra-urban health inequities and discussed how they can be addressed through urban planning policies and practices; and introduced the concept of intersectoral action for health as a practical approach to strengthen the cooperation between sectors such as local level policy-makers, urban planners and health practitioners. This was done by sharing WHO guidelines and practical examples from New York City, USA, and Jinchang, China.
 


Presenters of the session and links to the presentations:

 

Health equity and sustainable urban development in the post-2015 development agenda

8th April 2014, 10:30–12:00, One UN Room

The session brought together stakeholders interested in the post-2015 sustainable development agenda and invited their inputs on the structure and content of the second WHO-UN HABITAT joint report expected to be published in 2015. It was chaired by UN HABITAT and panellists included Alain Le Saux (Metropolis), Dr. Patricia O’Campo (University of Toronto) and Dr Arpana Verma (University of Manchester). WHO Kobe Centre introduced the process for the publication of the new joint report in 2015. Alain Le Saux emphasized the importance of provision of basic services in cities coupled with a focus on attaining equity as urbanization gathers pace in developing regions of the world. Dr O’Campo proposed that the new report should focus most of its attention to illustrating solutions for cities to broad problem areas, while Dr Verma mentioned the need for enhancing research and results for developing countries.
 


Links to the presentations: