Dates: 30-31 August 2016
Place: Nagoya, Japan
UNCRD organized the 45th Anniversary Commemorative Event on 30-31 August 2016 in collaboration with the Implementation Committee for the UNCRD 45th Anniversary Event, UNCRD Cooperation Association and Nagoya International Center. The aim of the event was to widely disseminate the four and a half decades of experience in various thematic areas with a view to move towards the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The event consisted of the Expert Group Meeting (EGM) on “Regional Development in the Context of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development”; the Public Symposium: “Wisdom of the World and Wisdom of Chubu ~ Sustainable and Resilient Regional Development ~ United Nations Centre for Regional Development”; and the technical tour to Toyota City. Through this event, UNCRD took stock of the achievements made during the past 45 years, affirmed the future direction that it should take, as well as disseminated widely the information on the activities of UNCRD and their effectiveness.
For the EGM, UNCRD engaged twenty-two experts, comprising two mayors (Surabaya, Indonesia and Toyota, Japan), scholars and practitioners of regional and urban development from Australia, Bangladesh, China, India, Mongolia, Japan, Sri Lanka, as well as experts from international organizations, such as OECD and UNISDR, and the private sector. It was attended by 80 participants, including ex-UNCRD staff members and the alumni of the training courses.
At the EGM, the new challenge and the future direction of UNCRD were discussed and affirmed to promote the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, recognizing the importance and relevance of UNCRD’s current initiatives of integrated regional development planning (IRDP), environmentally sustainable transport (EST), 3R (reduce, reuse, recycle), and IPLA – a SDG partnership on waste management at local and municipal level.
Finally, the EGM made following recommendations for UNCRD to efficiently and effectively assist developing countries to implement the new agenda: launching a vision in the context of 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development; creating a database and disseminate good practices of sustainable regional and urban development to developing countries; further expand its network that was built for the past forty-five years; strengthening its relationship with the local community.
At the end of the Commemorative Event, UNCRD conducted a technical tour for participating experts to learn the experience of Toyota City for creating a low-carbon society with the private sector. The experts visited Toyota Ecoful Town, which presents various innovative measures Toyota City has introduced to achieve a low-carbon emission lifestyle, as the results of empirical projects that the City carried out together with the private sector and the citizens, including the hydrogen station for Mirai, smart houses, smart mobility park and the Intelligent Transport System.