The UN Office for Sustainable Development (UNOSD) will host this international symposium to strengthen dissemination and sharing of good practices and lessons learned on fostering sustainable cities, in recognition of the role of cities in protecting the environment, improving disaster risk reduction (DRR) and resilience and reducing poverty. The symposium aims to identify strategies to strengthen local government institutional and technical capacity to address poverty reduction and slum upgrading, urban development, urban economic growth, urban transport and water and sanitation. The symposium also aims to identify areas for further capacity building and knowledge sharing and to identify innovative financing models to support urban infrastructure. The event will bring together representatives of governments, including and local government and planning officials, UN agencies, multilateral and regional development banks, the private sector and civil society in plenary sessions, working group sessions and panel discussions. The symposium is planned to overlap with the ‘Incheon Sister and Friendly Cities Conference,' which will be held in Incheon on 28 September 2013, and include mayors from cities around the world. The two events will have a joint closing session that will discuss advancing and implementing the sustainable urbanization agenda.  

dates: 26-28 September 2013   venue: Convention Center, SongdoDong   location: Incheon, Republic of Korea   www: http://www.unosd.org/index.php?page=view&type=13&nr=17&menu=177