MORE THAN 200 MAYORS COMMIT TO FIGHT AGAINST POVERTY, CITY-TO-CITY COOPERATION

AT BRUSSELS CONFERENCE ON LEAST DEVELOPED COUNTRIES

(Received from a UN Information Officer.)

BRUSSELS, 16 May -- A group of more than 200 mayors from throughout the world formally committed themselves today to the fight against poverty in their cities and expressed their determination to actively promote city-to-city cooperation, at the Third United Nations Conference on Least Developed Countries, being held in Brussels.

Adopting a declaration at the conclusion of a day-and-a-half-long “Meeting of Mayors”, the participants took special note of the particular structural difficulties facing cities in least developed countries (LDCs), as well as the poor living in them, and stressed that combating urban poverty was a shared commitment.  They also decided that all of their future action plans would make special provisions to address the needs of the poorest members of their societies, with an emphasis on women, children and the aged. 

They emphasized their intention to ensure the involvement of all affected citizens in putting together measures to address their situation and called on governments to address the situation of LDCs and the urban poor by a variety of measures, including debt cancellation and increased aid.

In another major outcome of the session, which sought to facilitate contacts between cities wishing to enter into partnerships, several announcements were made about the possibility of initiating formal city-to-city cooperative agreements.  Also, the World Bank explained its City Alliance Initiative, and a representative of the United Nation Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) announced a project that will allow cities to use the Internet for development purposes.  That project will be presented more fully by UNCTAD on Friday.

Announcing possible cooperation agreements were:  the Mayor of Port au Prince, Haiti, who said she had received indications of a desire for cooperation with certain cities in Madagascar; the Mayor of Banjoul, Gambia, who noted that discussions for cooperation had begun with Ostend, Belgium; the Mayor of Brussels, Belgium, who announced that he had had contacts with the cities of Kigali, Rwanda, Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Dakar, Senegal, and others; and the Mayor of Freetown, Sierra Leone, who said he had established points of reference for future cooperation with Brussels. 

The World Bank’s representative said the City Alliance Initiative -- a joint project of the Bank and the United Nations Centre for Human Settlements (Habitat), with Nelson Mandela as its patron -- is a global coalition of cities and their development partners, designed to improve the living conditions of the urban poor through city development strategies and the implementation of slum-upgrading programmes.  Thus far, some 20 countries had received $4 million in assistance.  The Initiative brought together all the various players as equal partners, promoted the exchange of knowledge and provided a window to promote local initiatives

Mamadou Diop, Mayor of Dakar, Senegal, rapporteur of the meeting, presented a report on the session’s proceedings and noted that, despite ongoing difficulties related to financing and autonomy, the current world environment favoured the emergence of city-to-city cooperation.  A number of new forms of cooperation with different objectives and methods of implementation were emerging.  A new way of thinking about how cities functioned and how the social relations within them were elaborated must be undertaken.  Cities must play a fundamental role in the worldwide fight against poverty.

In his concluding remarks to the participants, Rubens Ricupero, Secretary-General of UNCTAD, said the problems in LDCs and developing countries in general were more and more becoming urban problems, and that would accelerate in the future.  The challenges faced by LDCs could only be understood if the position of towns and cities, which were excellent examples of human cooperation, was considered.  The size of cities was clearly a problem -- certainly that could not be forgotten.  At the same time, cities presented amazing opportunities for cultural fulfilment.  He then gave an overview of a Brazilian initiative to encourage children to attend school by offering financial incentives to their parents.

Presentations on the challenges facing their cities were made by the Mayors of Dhaka, Bangladesh; Port au Prince, Haiti; and Kampala, Uganda.  Representatives of Brussels and the International Association of French-Speaking Mayors also spoke, as did the Mayor of Huy, Belgium, who is also an independent expert on extreme poverty from the United Nations Human Rights Commission,

Freddy Thielemans, Bourgmestre of Brussels, chaired the meeting and made concluding remarks. 

Mohan Cherifi, Coordinator of the World Alliance of Cities against Poverty, noted that all requests for cooperation made would be forwarded to the relevant world cooperative networks so that no one would leave the meeting empty handed. 

The next parallel event, a round-table discussion by members of the business sector, will begin at 2 p.m. today.

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