Durban hosts UCLG Learning Event: City to city partnerships to be developed between Latin America to Africa

The UCLG Strategic Planning learning event ’Fostering Learning of the Global South’ was organized from 13 to 15 June 2011 in coordination with the Durban Municipal institute of learning (MILE) and within the framework of UCLG work plan with Cities Alliance. It was  hosted by the  newly elected Mayor, Cllr. James Nxumalo, and the city Manager Michael Sutcliffe Vice-president of the UCLG Committee on Urban Strategic Planning.  The meeting counted with 120 participants and was aimed at sharing experiences between Latin American and African cities and to design models for city to city (mentoring) cooperation on strategic planning cycles.

 

The Mentoring Programme, City Future, launched by UCLG in 2008, has currently lead to 6 mentoring partnerships, 5 of them in Africa and 1 in Latin America with the support of the World Secretariat and paying special attention to is to be South-South cooperation.

 

The event in Durban involved  5 Brazilian cities. The cities of Sao Paulo, Belo Horizonte,  Salvador, Cape Town, Seville and the associations Ciudad Sur and Frente Nacional de Prefeitos have committed to undertaking mentoring activities. Among the thematic targets of the future activities is worth highlighting:  planning, particularly regarding informal settlements, infrastructure development, and financing such as for  port  cities, world cup preparation, land use management spatial development frameworks, town planning schemes, land value and regularization, development incentives

 

Next steps are to identify possible partnerships with African cities and to elaborate concepts to explore possible funding.

 

Of special interest to the Brazilian and African members is the (new) French and Brazilian programme on triangular decentralized cooperation. First initiatives are coming up, and  the African and Brazilian cities are interested in building on experiences of French cities.

 

A follow up learning event focusing on the Brazilian experience will take place during of the Metropolis Congress, in Porto Alegre, in November 2011

 

 

The  event counted with the active participation and support of Metropolis,  UCLGA, FMDV,  Salga,  ANAMM and the Frente de Prefeitos and MILE. Also partners such as  Caisse de Depot, AFD, UN Habitat, UNEP, World Bank and  GIZ.

 

Download the Newsletter

More information on the Mentoring Programme

Read the speech of the Mayor of eThekwini

Event’s presentations and reports