Sri Lankan housing programme highlighted at World Urban Forum

The Fourth World Urban Forum organised by the United Nations Centre for Human Settlements (UNCHS) was held in Nanjing, China recently. More than 5,000 foreign delegates from 175 countries including Sri Lanka participated at the Fourth World Urban Forum together with another 3,000 local delegates from the People's Republic of China.

Minister of Urban Development and Sacred Area Development Dinesh Gunawardena, Minister of Housing and Common Amenities Ferial Ashraff and delegation participated.

Ministers Dinesh Gunawardena and Mrs. Ferial Ashraff who participated the ministerial round table discussion with more than 100 ministerial representatives from various countries discussed various issues faced by the countries specially on climatic changes in urban areas.

Minister of Housing and Urban Rural Development of the People's Republic of China Jing Weixin and Vice Premier of People's Republic of China, Dejiang Zhang inaugurated the World Urban Forum with the participation of Prime Minister of Bahrain Shaikh KhalifaBin Salman Al Khalifa, Prime Minister of Kenya Raila Odinga, Vice President of the Philippine Noli De Castro.

Chinese Vice Premier Dejiang Zhang said that the theme of the Forum "Harmonious Urbanization" was critically important to the Chinese Government, which attached great importance to integrated development. They noted that China was focusing on coordinated development between its cities and regions and was placing special emphasis on energy saving and climate change mitigation.

Executive Director of UN Habitat Anna Tibaijuka thanked the Government of the People's Republic of China and the City of Nanjing for hosting the event and making the Forum a reality.

A special report published by the UNCHS on World Urban Forum-4 has shown that Sri Lanka is one of the leading countries involved in the process of minimising urban shanties and temporary houses. In this publication UNCHS has further pointed out that Sri Lanka together with Thailand and Tunisia are successfully involved in this process and are an example to other countries.

The fourth session of the World Urban Forum brings together a wide range of stakeholders who were focused on various aspects of harmonious urbanization, including territorial balance in urban development, social equity, urban environment and preserving the cultural heritage of cities.

Minister Gunawardena said "At a time when $700 billion can be found overnight to bailout the richest bankers in the world and $1,000 billion can be spent on a single 'war', sovereign wealth funds in far rich countries along are at $2,500 billion and growing, it stretches cruelty when we are told and discussing for years that the world can't find an extra $80 billion a year to meet the basic needs of food, water, sanitation and housing for the majority of the world's population." He said that "Sri Lanka views that this issue should be seriously taken note of and given the highest consideration."

The poor were represented by civil society groups, young people by youth groups, or women's organisations, the concept carried a message of hope in a world urbanising so quickly that, according to UN-HABITAT figures, two-thirds of humanity will be living in towns and cities in another generation.

It was decided to hold the Fifth World Urban Forum in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in 2010.