New Urban Agenda in Focus

UN Habitat’s Urban Pathways project supports cities in designing, planning and implementing green basic urban services as a means of reducing emissions.

The ‘Urban Pathways: Supporting Low Carbon Plans for Basic Services in the context of the New Urban Agenda’ project kicked off with a training week from 16 to 20 October 2017 in Berlin. More than a hundred experts and city representatives from 30 countries took part in the event. The project is being implemented by UN Habitat, together with its partners, the Wuppertal Institute of Climate, Energy and Environment, UN Environment, and a network of cities and regional experts. It aims to develop a number of specific steps that large cities in Asia, Africa and Latin America can take on the path to establishing low-carbon mobility, energy management and waste disposal systems.

At the opening of the workshop, Anke Brummer-Kohler, Director General Urban Development with the German Federal Environment Ministry (BMUB), highlighted the difficulties of reducing emissions, and the importance of demonstrating measures to improve the efficiency of basic services. This is where the Urban Pathways project, funded by BMUB’s International Climate Initiative (IKI), comes in, with its objective of reducing urban emissions and implementing practical measures, while involving various different interest groups.

‘Urban Pathways builds on existing partnerships such as the EU-supported SOLUTIONS project, and will take an integrated approach to urban energy, mobility and waste disposal systems,’ explained Andre Dzikus, Head of the Urban Basic Services Branch of UN Habitat. As new technologies emerge, the way basic services are provided is changing. In this area, cities’ options are expanding.

One of the core objectives of the Urban Pathways project is to create synergies between urban development initiatives. The kick-off event brought together IKI projects and other programmes. The four flagship cities of Kochi (India), Belo-Horizonte (Brazil), Nairobi (Kenya) and Hanoi (Viet Nam) presented a number of their activities in the fields of urban energy management, mobility and waste management. The partnership initiated at the event will form part of the international exchange, and will provide technical support for the introduction of measures and regional training courses. Themed e-learning modules will also be introduced soon.

Further information on the event and the Urban Pathways project is available at www.urban-pathways.org