Cities Alliance Consultative Group Meeting

The UCLG Africa secretary general attended the Cities Alliance Consultative Group meeting in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso, held from 3 to 4 November 2013 at the Azalai Independence Hotel.

The meeting was preceded on 4 November 2013 by a Policy Advisory Forum on the theme “Managing Urban Growth: key challenges for sound public policies”, chaired by its president, Ms Clare Short. The forum discussed the issues related to urban planning in a context of urban sprawl, with a view to link mastering of the urban growth and its financing. During the forum, the participants received presentations by Mr. Leandre Guigma, architect and urban planner at the ministry of housing and urban planning; Mr. Marin Ilboudo, president of the national association of the municipalities of Burkina Faso; and Mr. Antoine Sawadogo, former minister, chairperson of the Citizenship Laboratory.

The Consultative Group Meeting was held on 5 and 6 November 2013. This meeting was co-chaired by Mrs Lydia Kruse-Tiez, urban development and resilience unit, sustainable development network representative, World Bank; and Mr. Alioune Badiane, UN Habitat project office, UN Habitat.

The CG received firstly the report of the meetings of the CA Executive Committee held in February, June and November 2013. The CA CG meeting discussed and adopted the budget of the Cities Alliance for an interim period running from October to December 2013, and the budget of FY 2014. The CG also debated on governance matters and adopted the CA Performance Monitoring System. Also were on the agenda of the meeting: the presentation and discussion of the “urban expansion in secondary cities” (112 cities) introduced by H.E. Mr. Mekuria Haile, minister urban development and construction, Ethiopia, who presented in particular the Ethiopia cities program initiative (ECPI); and Dave DeGroot, consultant; the presentation and approval of the Cities Alliance strategy for Africa introduced by Serge Allou, lead urban specialist, Cities Alliance Secretariat; the Habitat III Joint Work Program Paper introduced by the CA secretariat.

During the opening ceremony of the Policy Advisory Forum, the Burkina Faso country program agreement was signed between the ministry of housing and urban planning, UN Habitat, and Cities Alliance.

Photo Reunion-groupe-consultatif-CA