Event: International Symposium on Sustainable Cities: Empowering Local Governments through Capacity Building [viewed]
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.
2 May 2013: The 7th Conference on Community-Based Adaptation to Climate Change (CBA7) was organized around the theme 'mainstreaming CBA into national and local planning.' 
2 May 2013: The UNFCCC Secretariat has released the outcome of the 10th Meeting of Inventory Lead Reviewers on the Options to Improve the Cost-effectiveness, Efficiency and Practicality of the review process (FCCC/SBSTA/2013/INF.2). Participants noted that the implementation of the existing review process of national communications and national greenhouse gases (GHG) inventories is resource intensive, and that the newly-established international assessment and review (IAR) process for developed countries, to be launched in early 2014, will impose a substantial increase of work.
6 May 2013: “Countries discussed concrete solutions to speed up and scale up action and they are committed to sticking to their own timetable,” said Christiana Figueres, UNFCCC Executive Secretary, reporting on discussions held during the second session of the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action (ADP 2).
3 May 2013: Over 70 participants attended the seventh meeting of the Pilot Program for Climate Resilience (PPCR) for pilot countries and participating regions, which provided countries and regional organizations with opportunities to share challenges and experiences in implementing their programmes to enhance climate resilient development.
2 May 2013:
The 69th Commission Session of the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP) met under the theme, 'Building resilience to natural disasters and major economic crises,' and concluded with the adoption of 17 resolutions aiming to balance the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainable development for regional well-being.
30 April 2013: At the first consultative workshop on Development, Transfer and Dissemination of Clean and Environmentally Sound Technologies in Developing Countries, panelists and participants addressed science and technology needs and options for poverty eradication and sustainable development, with a focus on the cases of agriculture and energy.
26 April 2013: The Commonwealth Secretariat hosted representatives of very small States in a meeting on the specific challenges that micro-States face in delivering sustainable development. Discussions focused on governance, policy and public administration in micro-States.
