06 November 2024

U7 bring call for multilevel cooperation to tackle urbanisation challenges to the World Urban Forum

How can G7 economies help solve the challenges faced by cities across the world? What are the G7 planning to advance sustainable development at the city and national level? How can G7 countries best cooperate with local governments to advance sustainable and inclusive urban development? These questions and many more were discussed by representatives from the Italian G7 presidency, UNHABITAT and U7 representatives at the World Urban Forum this week.

Dr. Alessandro Ghinelli, Mayor of Arezzo (Italy), brough the U7 message for Boosting Progress towards G7 Objective through Sustainable Cities, Urbanization and Multilevel Cooperation to the event. Highlighting not only the key role of local and regional governments in combating climate change and preparing local communities from its effects and greatest risks, the Mayor underlined impressively cities readiness “to play their part, as they always did” for advancing a climate resilient, sustainable urban development across the globe. To leverage cities’ full potential, the Mayor called on national governments to intensify cooperation with the U7 and their local and regional governments. City diplomacy, close multi-level governance and supporting local investment capacities will enable local governments to drive forward local transitions with the urgently required integrated, ambitious, and uniquely place-based measures necessary to prepare a climate resilient urban future.

In his address, Mayor Ghinelli commented:

"While it is strongly welcomed the recommendation to recognize the U7 as an official engagement group in the Urban Development Communique, only the final formalization will properly institutionalize the collaboration between G7 leaders and local governments and align engagement with the formal cooperation commitments made by G7 leaders and ministers in the past. This step should be taken as soon as possible, in order to ensure a structured, ongoing dialogue across all policy tracks. This will be vital for enabling cities and municipalities to contribute their perspective and solutions to global challenges such as climate action and sustainable urban development. It will ultimately boost G7 progress towards shared goals and objectives."

In this regard, the Takamatsu principles within the Kagawa - Takamatsu Communiqué defined by G7 urban ministers, vowing to support local governments to achieve climate neutrality and resilience, the promotion of sustainable transport, energy-efficiency, biodiversity and multilevel governance, was discussed. The current G7 Italian Presidency has taken the next step in the process by developing an action framework to collect national and local urban initiatives, identify priorities and integrated thematic areas and to assess initiatives related to existing sustainable development frameworks such as the SDGs and European Union Cohesion Policy Targets.  

Stream the whole session recording at UN WEB TV