The Canadian Minister for Labour and Housing, Mr. Joe Fontana, on Friday invited delegates at the 13th Session of the Commission on Sustainable Development to the third session of the World Urban Forum to be held in Vancouver next year.
Mr. Fontana and Mrs. Anna Tibaijuka, the Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and Executive Director of UN-HABITAT, made the invitation at a reception at the UN headquarters in New York. Mrs. Tibaijuka thanked the Canadian government for hosting the next World Urban Forum. The occasion will mark 30 years since the Vancouver conference that gave rise to UN-HABITAT. She hoped that this event would help raise the profile of urbanization and help the world overcome the problems of slum formation. She said she hoped that the international community would commit more resources to financing slum upgrading. Mr. Fontana congratulated Mrs. Tibaijuka for helping to raise the profile of rapid urbanization around the world and cited the way she had taken charge of the Millennium Development Goal target on slum upgrading.
Mr. Fontana said Canada and Vancouver would welcome all Habitat Agenda partners, representatives of governments, civil society, the private sector, communities and ordinary citizens to next year’s World Urban Forum.
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