9 October 2014: The 75th session of the UN Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE) Committee on Housing and Land Management (CHLM) agreed on the text of the Geneva UN Charter on Sustainable Housing and decided on new work regarding energy efficiency in housing, smart cities, urban planning and disaster risk reduction, social housing, preparations for the Third United Nations on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development (Habitat III), and various issues in land administration and management. The CHLM met from 8-9 October 2014 in Geneva, Switzerland.

The session’s principal output was agreement on the Geneva UN Charter on Sustainable Housing, a set of principles and guidelines intended to guide housing policy and cooperation on housing matters among the 56 member States of the UNECE. The Committee also reviewed its biennial work program and the implementation of the Strategy for Sustainable Housing and Land Management in the ECE region for the period 2014-2020 adopted by CHLM in 2013.

Among other things, the Committee: approved a study on developing standards for energy efficiency in housing; reviewed progress on a survey on challenges and priorities in housing and urban development that will serve as the UNECE’s chief input to Habitat III; received a progress report on the UNECE’s Smart Cities Project, which seeks to develop a series of smart city “profiles” and indicators, promote activities in six pilot cities, and develop a wider network of smart cities both within and outside the ECE region to exchange best practices; endorsed a proposal to develop a policy brief on urban planning that would contain recommendations for addressing disaster risks, which would be followed up by technical advisory services for interested countries to develop policies based on the brief’s recommendations; reviewed the preliminary conclusions of studies on social housing, informal settlements and the advantages and disadvantages of mergers of land registries and cadastres; and heard reports from Tajikistan, Moldova and Uzbekistan to implement recommendations in their UNECE country profiles on housing and land management. [CHLM 75 home page] [IISD RS Summary of CHLM 75] [IISD RS article on the Charter]