India calls for strengthening of UN-Habitat

India has called for setting up a new mechanism to ensure better coordination between the UN-Habitat and all other agencies of the world body for better implementation of the urban agenda and sustainable development goals.
The UN-Habitat is an organ of the United Nations that promotes socially and environmentally sustainable human settlements across the world. The UN-Habitat reports to the United Nations General Assembly.
Addressing a General Assembly meeting on UN Habitat, Additional Secretary in the Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs Rajiv Ranjan Mishra said there was a need to ensure that all UN agencies and UN-Habitat work in tandem to strengthen implementation of the urban agenda and sustainable development goals.

"In this regards, the recommendation to strengthen UN- Habitat by establishing UN-Urban, as a mechanism based in New York with the purpose of identifying opportunities for collaboration across agencies and countries needs further consideration," he said here yesterday.
Mishra said the new coordinating mechanism could only be effective in meeting its purpose of establishment when UN- Habitat is empowered as the lead coordinator for monitoring and utilising mutual strengths for all UN programming at country and regional levels.
He said the Indian government's message was that UN- Habitat is strengthened to provide high-quality support in Asia Pacific region and to make the necessary and swift decisions at high level for improved and more inclusive governance.

Mishra noted that the current dispensation of UN-Habitat as an institution, which is not fully self-sustained in financial terms, may not be viable and needs further strengthening.

"We would like to stress that more emphasis is needed on the aspect of how member states will engage and align with Habitat's mandate. While a renewed focus of UN-Habitat on normative work is welcome, it is equally important to note that there is a complementarity and synergy between normative and operational work in the country context," Mishra said.
He also said the governing structure of UN-Habitat broadly operates based on the country representations through the system of Committee of Permanent Representatives (CPR) and the governing council.

"We feel that this current overall governance structure for policy and operational guidance is broadly in order, and has been effectively examining and modulating policy responses for the urban sector at large," he said, adding that the renewed structure should be clearly deliberated with clearly defined roles and responsibilities and should not lead to further stress the capacities of the organisation.