U N D P - U N H A B I TAT E N H A N C E D C O L L A B O R AT I V E F R A M E WO R K

FOREWORD 2

GLOBAL CONTEXT 4

WHY DEVELOP A COLLABORATIVE FRAMEWORK? 4

GUIDING PRINCIPLES 5

UNDP AND UN-HABITAT PARTNERSHIP 6

PRIORITIZED AREAS FOR COLLABORATION 6

1. National Urban Policies (NUPs) 6

2. Financing for development 7

3. Climate action 8

4. Urban resilience 8

5. Digital transformation 9

MOVING FORWARD 9

ANNEX I – DRAFT ACTION PLAN (2021–2022) 11

REFERENCES 14

CONTENTS

UNDP-UNHABITAT ENHANCED COLLABORATIVE FRAMEWORK I 1

UNDP-UNHABITAT ENHANCED COLLABORATIVE FRAMEWORK

Cities are the locus of development, human creativity and progress, being responsible for 80 per cent of global GDP. As the world rapidly urbanizes, the relevance of cities cannot be overstated. Cities consume 80 per cent of the worlds’ energy and produce more than 70 per cent of the world’s GHG emissions, for instance, and will be key players to support a just and fair transition to a carbon-neutral economy.

The COVID-19 pandemic provides a stark reminder that more than ever cities are in the frontlines of the response and recovery, with initially over 90 per cent of the confirmed cases happening in cities before spreading across whole territories. The pandemic is re-shaping urban life around the world.

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) have a long history of partnership. To meet the challenges of the present and future, both our organizations have decided to enhance their collaboration to accelerate the implementation of the New Urban Agenda (NUA) adopted at Habitat III in 2016, the Paris Agreement, and the 2030 Agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) globally, in accordance with the UN system-wide strategy for sustainable urbanization. Furthermore, within the current global context, UNDP and UN-Habitat commit to ensuring their offer is aligned with the needs of countries and cities in their response to and recovery from COVID-19.

This enhanced Collaborative Framework informs the development of its Action Plan (2021–2022) with concrete actions per priority area, and a selected cohort of countries and cities for rolling out joint integrated support. During these two years of accelerated urban action, UNDP and UN-Habitat intend to demonstrate concrete results and make these available to Member States at the High-Level Meeting on the review of the implementation of the New Urban Agenda to be convened by the President of the UN General Assembly in New York in September 2022 and to diverse stakeholders at the next session of the World Urban Forum to be held in Katowice (Poland) in 2022.

FOREWORD

OVER 90% OF THE CONFIRMED CASES HAPPENING IN CITIES BEFORE SPREADING ACROSS WHOLE TERRITORIES.

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The COVID-19 pandemic has ushered in a time of unprecedented and unexpected changes. We must take the opportunity presented by the COVID-19 pandemic to “nudge” countries in the right direction towards the next generation of future-proof cities.

Now is the moment for governments, academia, civil society and the private sector to re-envision together how they might innovate a socio-economic system that is capable of responding to the demands of the 21st Century. This cannot happen without the direct engagement of cities.

As we build back better and greener, we need to rebalance the roles of the public and private sectors and ensure that no one and no place is left behind.

The pandemic started in cities because of their connectedness. This does not mean we should disconnect. Achieving cities that are healthy, inclusive, sustainable and resilient will require foresight, solidarity and commitment. Supporting national governments and equipping our cities, including local governments, societies, and business to leverage a green recovery and the digital transformation to deliver the next generation of cities will be central.

At this critical moment for humanity, UNDP and UN-Habitat have committed to working together to seize this tipping-point opportunity for the long-term public good for people and the planet.

Achim Steiner Maimunah Mohd SharifAdministrator, United Nations Executive Director, United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Human Settlements Programme (UN‐Habitat)

New York and Nairobi, 3 December 2020

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GLOBAL CONTEXTToday, over half of the world’s population lives in urban areas. In the next 30 years, two thirds of the world’s population will be urban. Most of this growth, at least 90 per cent, will take place in sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Asia.

Urbanization is one of the most important global trends of the 21st century. It is a transformative force that, if properly harnessed, can help countries and cities overcome major development challenges by boosting social inclusion, economic growth, sustainability, climate action, peace and resilience. The benefits are clear, but countries and cities need to be prepared to meet the present and future challenges.

As we enter the ‘decade of action’ — the last 10 years to make the SDGs a reality — a next generation of people-centric cities that balance sustainability with prosperity is required. Cities all over the world are at the frontline of the global response against the COVID-19 pandemic. In this scenario, three key messages have emerged strongly. Firstly, the pandemic has made more visible and is reinforcing pre-existing inequalities and aggravating poverty levels – particularly in poorly managed areas and neighbourhoods with precarious infrastructure.

Secondly, we need to pay attention to the support provided to cities – capacities and resources available to respond to COVID-19 – particularly those included in national fiscal stimulus packages. As of now, cities bear the biggest brunt of the pandemic but are insufficiently resourced to respond. And thirdly, designing a green recovery without cities is simply not viable. Climate action, including nationally determined contributions (NDCs) that are at the centre of the Paris Agreement, and post COVID-19 recovery and longer-term vulnerability strategies need to account for and engage cities.

WHY DEVELOP A COLLABORATIVE FRAMEWORK? Both organizations have a Strategic Plan — UNDP (2018–2021) and UN-Habitat (2020–2023) — that recognizes the complexity of evolving urban challenges and the interrelated development choices faced by countries and cities.

Given the current trends and the relevance of urbanization for the work of the United Nations, UN agencies produced a system-wide UN strategy for sustainable urban development in 2019. The strategy calls upon the agencies to enhance coherent efforts to assist Member States in harnessing opportunities and meeting the challenges of rapid urbanization through the implementation of the NUA to accelerate the SDGs implementation.

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In the context of ongoing UN reforms called for by Member States and promoted by the Secretary General, the strategic partnership aims to scale up impact by leveraging UNDP and UN-Habitat’s comparative advantages and complementarities and defining opportunities pro-actively to drive action towards the 2030 Agenda. Where possible, UNDP and UN-Habitat will anchor the partnership within the United Nations Sustainable Development Cooperation Frameworks to promote at the country level a whole-of-system approach to sustainable urban development.

GUIDING PRINCIPLESTo move forward speedily and ensure the Collaborative Framework serves UNDP’s and UN-Habitat’s joint aspirations in support of internationally agreed goals and commitments, the following ex-ante guiding principles are put forward to frame the cooperation and the areas for collaboration.

Acknowledging the complexity of development challenges countries and cities face, which has distinct contours in urban settings and takes on specific urgencies alongside rapid urbanization and the COVID-19 recovery, four guiding principles frame the collaboration and prioritized actions:

➊ Recognize the distinct sets of expertise and capacities in each organization and build on the respective complementarities to meet the demands of countries and cities in a nimble and agile manner.

➋ Prioritize quick wins that could be rapidly scaled up and deployed for impactful results, meeting the demands of countries and cities vis-à-vis the urbanization agenda and COVID-19 recovery.

➌ Facilitate the operationalization of the NUA to accelerate the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and to risk-proof development gains.

➍ Adopt a human rights-based approach to sustainable urbanization that explicitly engages the urban poor, women, slum dwellers, minorities, youth, older people, people with disabilities, migrants and refugees/displaced persons and other marginalized and most vulnerable groups.

➎ Collaborate to mobilize a broader UN engagement with a view towards implementing the UN system-wide Strategy on Sustainable Urban Development.

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UNDP AND UN-HABITAT PARTNERSHIPUNDP and UN-Habitat have 40 years of common history. The first Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) signed between the two agencies was in 1990, then in 2002 and 2008. In line with system-wide UN reform, UNDP and UN-Habitat are seeking flexible arrangements that can augment their impact and services to countries in the area of sustainable urban development.

UN-Habitat and UNDP have enjoyed a longstanding partnership across normative and operational contexts. The focus of this collaboration ranges from improving the living conditions of refugees and peacebuilding in crisis zones to strengthening local governance and decentralized service delivery and supporting low-carbon resilient development.

Currently UN-Habitat is implementing 20 projects funded through UNDP, valued at US$80 million. The majority of these joint projects (about 90 per cent) are in the Arab States region (e.g., Iraq, Lebanon, Syria) and the Africa region (e.g., Ethiopia, Mozambique, Somalia, South Sudan). Two thirds of these projects focus on reconstruction/resilience and/or urban planning. The remaining deal with access to land and local governance/development.

The collaboration moving forward is framed by the 2030 Agenda, the Paris Agreement and the NUA, and the current need to support countries and cities in responding to and recovering from the multifaceted COVID-19 crisis.

PRIORITIZED AREAS FOR COLLABORATIONGuided by the principles above, UNDP and UN-Habitat Teams identified the following priority areas under this collaboration to be further detailed in the Action Plan (a living document).

1. NATIONAL URBAN POLICIES (NUPS)

COVID-19 will require an integrated, territorial and systems approach to recovery that values the potential of urbanization to national development and that takes into account the underlying drivers of risk associated with poverty, lack of education, poor access to health care and environmental degradation, among others. Inadequate and poor territorial and urban planning increases inequality across territories and within cities, poorly distributing job opportunities and public goods, aggravating gender disparities, enabling insecurity and crime, undermining forms of social capital and increasing disaster risk and vulnerabilities. Further, the lack of comprehensive NUPs contributes to easily avoidable greenhouse gas

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emissions resulting from poor spatial planning and decision-making and an incoherent approach to urban systems. Many countries also lack the technical capacities to mainstream urban development into their national development planning to transform their economies to arrive at an appropriate mix of agriculture, industry and services. With rapid urbanization, the number of countries demanding support for the development of NUPs have significantly increased. UN-Habitat is already providing support to over 60 countries for the formulation or/and implementation of NUPs. UNDP remains a strategic partner to Ministries of National Planning and Economic Development in over 100 countries. By combining forces, UN-Habitat and UNDP will significantly scale up and integrate NUPs into whole-of-government national development and economic planning development efforts. This will require supporting governments to establish mechanisms, financing frameworks, platforms and infrastructure for the implementation of NUPs that will continue to be critical for recovery from COVID-19 and preparing countries and cities for a sustainable future.

2. FINANCING FOR DEVELOPMENT

Access to finance is a major constraint for city and regional governments worldwide. It is necessary to ensure their vital role in national economies and to deliver on national and local development agendas, including the 2030 Agenda, and a better recovery during the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. COVID-19 lockdowns have directly impacted local economies as cities in general rely on local revenue largely from tax receipts that keep their cities and its public services running. Local authorities will have 15 per cent to 25 per cent fewer revenues in 2021, which if not addressed will put investments in service delivery and sustainable urban development efforts in jeopardy. Though every city and country have a varied model of autonomy in revenue collection or decentralization of municipal budgeting, this is an issue that local economies are facing globally. It is necessary, therefore, to scale up efforts to implement urban planning and develop effective, innovative and sustainable financing frameworks and instruments for sustainable urbanization at the municipal level. Cities are increasingly open to using a diverse set of financing instruments, including blended finance, impact investment, public-private partnerships, climate funds, property taxation, land value capture, bond issuances, loan guarantees and other debt instruments. Recently, the UN has been leveraging its collective assets across agencies to support governments in developing Integrated National Financing Frameworks (INFFs) that will enable them to facilitate financing for their COVID-19 recovery and a new generation of national Medium-Term Development Plans that ensure a green, equitable and resilient recovery. The Joint SDG Fund is investing $60 million across 62 countries and UNDP is directly leading the efforts in 58 countries. UN-Habitat is focusing on enhancing local revenue generation and establishing a city investment facility through its SDG Cities flagship programme. This work could facilitate the development of people-centred urban financing and investment strategies as an integral part of national financing frameworks.

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3. CLIMATE ACTION

Addressing climate change begins in cities if we are to stay below the 1.5°C limit global climate target. Cities use 80 per cent of the world’s energy, emit more than 70 per cent of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions and bear the brunt of climate impact, with over 800 million people at risk from the impacts of rising seas and storm surges. Cities have also been leading the way in setting ambitious targets and driving innovative solutions. As the critical locus for climate action, the potential contribution of cities needs to be fully captured in the NDCs, and cities need to efficiently integrate NDC implementation into local development plans if countries are to raise their NDC ambition. Countries and cities are requesting support to prepare and implement climate action planning, conduct risk assessments and mapping, advise on clean mobility options and access climate finance for cities, integrating urban and human settlement issues into national mitigation and adaptation plans and recovery plans related to COVID-19. UNDP is rolling out the Climate Promise Initiative aimed at helping 114 countries enhance their NDCs by 2020–2021 and to support 20 cities with their climate targets, while UN-Habitat has been leading the development of normative tools for strengthening urbanization dimensions in the NDCs and the National Adaptation Plans (NAPs).

4. URBAN RESILIENCE

Over the next 30 years, an estimated $90 trillion will be invested in urban infrastructure. This provides an enormous opportunity to build resilient infrastructure and apply the building back better approach to urban recovery and reconstruction that reduces vulnerability, and therefore risk, to future disasters and builds urban and community-level resilience to address physical, social, environmental, and economic vulnerabilities. In the Arab Region alone, UNDP and UN-Habitat have already developed joint-programmes to address the urban infrastructure needs in the following countries: Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Yemen. UNDP and UN-Habitat are partners to the Global Commission on Adaptation’s Action Track on Urban Resilience. UN-Habitat has a signature initiative on ‘Building Climate Resilience of the Urban Poor’ launched at the 2019 Climate Action Summit and an initiative under the Global Commission on Adaptation’s Action Track on urban resilience. Urban and community resilience is also a key pillar in the UN framework for the immediate socio-economic response to COVID-19. UNDP and UN-Habitat have worked jointly on the ‘UN Resilience Framework’, which uses a multi-hazard, multi-stakeholder and multi-sectoral approach to resilience building. While the UN Resilience Framework tackles the issue at the national level, a city resilience impact could be envisaged as part of the joint collaboration.

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5. DIGITAL TRANSFORMATION

Cities are turning to smart technologies to address needs of a growing population and to enhance the quality of urban life, build their competitiveness, achieve growth in a sustainable and inclusive manner and protect the environment. This needs to be accelerated as cities respond to the COVID-19 pandemic and its impact on the way we live and work, impacting disproportionately on households that lack access to digital technologies and are unable to work from home or adapt to home schooling, and on micro-small and medium enterprises (MSMEs) with connectivity issues that are unable to fully profit from a digital economy. Investments in smart cities initiatives around the world are expected to rise to around $190 billion in 2023. As cities explore new approaches, they need support in ensuring people-centred approaches to smart cities that advance local aspirations and meet the SDG goals by applying smart technologies to design innovative city efforts, overcome the digital divide and help drive real urban transformation. Building on collaboration on smart cities since Habitat-III, UNDP and UN-Habitat will leverage joint expertise and networks to provide such support in a systematic way.

MOVING FORWARD UNDP and UN-Habitat will capitalize on each other’s strengths and create synergies to deploy a joint urban offer to a select cohort of countries and cities. The schematic Action Plan (2021–2022) will be a living document that is continuously updated to include targets (quick wins and medium-term gains), detailed activities, resources needed and a timeline (see Annex I).

To facilitate the deployment of a technical package of support and operationalization of this offer across countries and cities, UNDP and UN-Habitat teams will develop a business model and partnership arrangements based on current best practices and experiences of local and multi-country offices. An effort will be made to develop subregional strategies to roll out the Collaborative Framework and the Action Plan, by which the partnership will be anchored appropriately in regional collaboration platforms and issue-based coalitions to promote a whole-of-system approach. Such upfront investment in planning among UNDP and UN-Habitat colleagues working at the regional, subregional and country levels will at once increase buy-in and ensure the partnership reflects local contexts and capacities. It will as well provide the basis for troubleshooting and the option of course corrections.

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The Action Plan will advance technical collaboration across the five priority areas, through the identification of synergies and complementarities of portfolios. A cohort of countries and cities to be supported will be selected based on a criteria that takes into account the following:

i. strong demand from countries and cities in line with the five priority areas;

ii. capacities of sub-regional and country teams to actively engage in the delivery of joint support on integrated areas relevant to sustainable urbanization;

iii. resources availability, including technical and financial capacities; and

iv. coverage of countries and cities across regions, considering different country typologies (low- and middle-income countries, SIDS, fragile contexts etc).

The criteria should also consider ongoing initiatives and processes that can create entry points for the joint sustainable urbanization offer such as:

i. countries that are developing INFFs (62 countries globally) or National Urban Policies (60 countries);

ii. countries that are part of UNDP’s Climate Promise Initiative to enhance their NDCs (114 countries); and

iii. countries whereas UNCTs are initiating the development of a Common Country Analysis (CCAs) and Cooperation Framework in 2021.

Both organizations commit to amplifying their global advocacy efforts on issues of common interest by setting clear advocacy goals for the upcoming biennium period. This is intended to give the partnership visibility, raise funds for joint programming, advance a model for integrated policy support and mobilize investment of urban infrastructure and basic services. The biennium advocacy efforts will culminate in opportunities to raise awareness among Member States at the High-Level Meeting of the UN General Assembly (2022), and among diverse stakeholders at the 11th Session of the World Urban Forum (2022).

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ANNEX I – DRAFT ACTION PLAN (2021–2022)

FOCUS AREAS ADVOCACYBUSINESS MODEL ARRANGEMENTS

Identify select subregions/countries/cities (where clear demand exists) to roll out an integrated package of support, with a concrete set of joint actions and timeline. Under each priority area, both organizations commit to identifying quick wins during the first year, continuing to scale up or moving onto other areas in subsequent years.

Develop a policy advocacy plan, including joint field missions and resource mobilization (to meet common defined goals).

Develop a business plan with targets, actions, timelines and needed resources (technical and financial).

1. Develop an integrated package to support countries to develop the next generation of NUPs/Strategies/Policies, which include components of legislation, planning, financing, data and analytics, capacity-building and local governance.

UNDP: Renata Rubian, Babatunde Abidoye, Patrick Duong, Gonzalo Pizarro, Devika Iyer

UN-Habitat: Rafael Tuts, Remy Sietchiping; Dyfed Aubrey

1. Issue a joint letter to all staff on the occasion of the signature of the Enhanced Collaborative Framework. The letter is to be circulated to relevant governance bodies.

2. Develop resource mobilization goals with a clear targeted approach for 2021, including joint missions for resource mobilization (as appropriate given the restrictions of travel).

3. Conduct joint missions to countries, to show synergistic actions on the ground (this needs to be adapted to the reality of COVID-19).

1. Technical teams will develop a business model considering the operationalization modalities to facilitate the technical collaboration and financial execution on the ground (UNDP to consult with its COs and UN-Habitat with its regional and local offices to understand the operational bottlenecks).

2. UNDP-UN-Habitat will establish a light governance arrangement – for instance, a steering committee to keep each organization informed, monitor implementation and review joint policy.

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FOCUS AREAS ADVOCACYBUSINESS MODEL ARRANGEMENTS

2. Financing for development. Select countries developing an Integrated National Financing Framework (cohort of 62 countries) to integrate the elements of local and regional engagement, with clear implications for municipal financing.

UNDP: Marcos Neto, Thomas Beloe, Orria Goni, Renata Rubian

UN-Habitat: Neil Khor, Marco Kamiya, Dyfed Aubrey

3. Define climate action priorities for 2021, which advance the NDC ambition and commitments of countries by engaging cities in the delivery of a climate promise and by including urban targets in the enhanced NDCs.

UNDP: Cassie Flynn, Laura Hammet

UN-Habitat: Bernhard Barth

4. Urban resilience building for the ‘UN Resilience Framework’ that includes components of UN-Habitat’s City Resilience Global Programme as well as UNDP’s large experience on risk reduction country implementation.

UNDP: Ronald Jackson, Amita Gill

UN-Habitat: Filiep Decorte, Esteban Leon

4. Explore advocacy goals linked to the UN Decade of Action and Climate Action, including specific subregional plans.

5. Develop a plan of engagement for the High-Level Meeting of the UN General Assembly (September 2022), New York.

6. Develop a plan of engagement, including broader stakeholders, for the 11th Session of the World Urban Forum (2022), Katowice (Poland).

3. In order to ensure enhanced collaboration throughout each organization, develop an engagement protocol for country office teams.

5. Develop a harmonized coordination approach (e.g., joint briefings to regional offices and/or country offices, as required on issue-based).

6. Explore regional/subregional adaptative business models according to specific contexts and plans.

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FOCUS AREAS ADVOCACYBUSINESS MODEL ARRANGEMENTS

5. Smart cities (digitalization)Leverage existing partnerships and expertise to 1) help build smart city capacities through a peer-to-peer learning network, facilitating knowledge exchange between cities and channeling best-fit expertise where needed; and 2) catalyze SDG-anchored smart city solutions through collaborative research and targeted on-the- ground efforts.

UNDP : Bradley Busetto, Minerva Novero, Calum Handforth, Asami Okahashi

UN-Habitat: Neil Khor, Katja Schaefer, Pontus Westerberg

Advance technical collaboration

1. Technical teams to further examine modalities for promoting shared intelligence more generally between UNDP and UN-Habitat staff, (e.g., UN-Habitat participating in UNDP’s Community of Practices, joint webinars).

2. Include UN-Habitat staff in UNDP expert rosters, including SURGE deployment modalities (particularly for post-conflict and post-disaster settings).

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United Nations. Transforming our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, A/RES/70/1, 2015.

United Nations (2017). The New Urban Agenda

United Nations Chief Executives Board for Coordination. United Nations system-wide strategy on sustainable urban development. May 2019. CEB/2019/1/Add.5

United Nations Development Programme (2017). UNDP Strategic Plan (2018–2021), DP/2017/38.

UN-Habitat (2020). World Cities Report 2020: The Value of Sustainable Urbanization.

UN-Habitat (2019). UN-HabitatStrategic Plan (2020–2023).

United Nations Development Programme (2016). Sustainable Urbanization Strategy.

United Nations (2018), The World’s Cities in 2018—Data Booklet (ST/ESA/ SER.A/417). 2018, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division.

United Nations (2019), World Urbanization Prospects: The 2018 Revision, Department of Economic and Social Affairs, Population Division.

REFERENCES

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