The first-ever ministerial meeting on urbanization and climate change

The first-ever ministerial meeting on urbanization and climate change

The Egyptian COP27 Presidency will convene the first-ever ministerial meeting on urbanization and climate change at the UN Climate Change Conference of Parties on 17 November 2022. The session will focus on housing, urban development, and multilevel action for climate change. This meeting is hosted by Assem Abdelhamid Hafez El Gazzar, Minister for Housing, Utilities, and Urban Communities of Egypt.

This meeting will reinforce the Paris Climate Agreement Commitments and discuss commitments to climate change mitigation, climate change adaptation, and local climate finance. The COP27 initiative Sustainable Urban Resilience for the Next Generation (SURGe) will be launched at the event.

For the first time, the meeting will bring together ministers of housing, urban development, environment, and climate change. Representatives of local and regional governments through the Local Governments and Municipal Authorities Constituency to the UNFCCC, as well as non-party and non-state actors such as academia, civil society, non-governmental organizations, think tanks, the private sector, urban networks, multilateral banks, UN agencies, and intergovernmental organizations, and other observers will also be present.

Why a ministerial meeting at COP27?

National governments are increasingly supporting local climate action. Around 84 % of the updated Nationally Determined Commitments have strong or moderate urban content compared to 69% in the