NEWS

         

From 24 to 28 September, Of the 24 to the 28 of September was held in Manizales, Colombia, the XII Ibero-American Congress of Municipalists, hosted by the Government of Caldas, with the theme "A Territorial Agenda for Sustainable Development Goals." The congress promoted a broad debate on the implementation of the Agenda 2030 and has shown various local initiatives, among which we highlight the achievements and challenges presented by some Metropolis members.

On 25 September, Lia Brum, responsible for Latin America at the Metropolis Secretariat General, acted as spokesperson of our membership in the panel "Territorial Development and Sustainability from the gender perspective", during which she exhibited how Metropolis is currently working for the incorporation of the gender perspective in the major cities through the activation of metropolitan mobility, considered as a powerful tool for the realization of the right to the city.

She included to her presentation the examples from metropolises that have diagnosed the different uses of public transportation, including data disaggregated by gender, for the formulation of concrete actions that provide greater security for women in their day-to-day journeys. The presentation brought as examples of such approach the initiatives of Bogota, Mexico City and Quito, whose teams, although not able to be in Manizales, collaborated with contents to the presentation (click here to download it, in Spanish).

On the same day, at one of the first plenary sessions of the program, the Secretary of Citizen Participation of Medellín, Andrés Felipe Bedoya, highlighted how all projects for sustainable development and a peace culture carried out by the city follow the route of the global agendas, especially of the Agenda 2030.

On 26 September, the panel "Governance and Metropolitanism: when the local government is not enough” counted on the presentations from representatives of Caracas and Maracaibo metropolitan municipalities.This panel highlighted the challenges to implement local agendas sustainable development agendas in line with the global conventions and, at the same time, in concerted action with the diversity of actors present in the metropolitan territories, which often overlap and are not coordinated. These challenges are particularly more difficult in the current context of Venezuelan cities, whichhave their political representatives under persecution by the national government, or even in prison.

In the lecture "Territorial Economic Development to achieve a sustainable and inclusive development for all", held on 26 September, the work of UCLG was highlighted, for its efforts in the identification of how local governments are reaching the implementation of the SDGs. The first results of this work are found in the publication "National and Sub-national Governments on the Way towards the localization of the SDGs" (click here to download it).

The congress was concluded on 28 September with the adoption of the Declaration of Caldas: "A Territorial Agenda for the objectives of sustainable development. The Role of Local Governments". The full document (in Spanish) can be read here.