 Twelve lucky winners from around the world were this week each handed a USD 30,000 cash prize, a gilted wind tower and a certificate for their work in promoting a better urban future in a glittering ceremony marking the seventh Dubai International Award for Best Practices.
The award ceremony was attended by Shaikh Hamdan Bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Deputy Ruler of Dubai, UAE Minister of Finance and Chairman of Dubai Municipality, who personally conferred the prizes. These went to 10 winners from Burundi, China, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Indonesia, Mexico, Senegal, South Africa, Spain, and the United States in the Best Practices category, and to two winners from Palestine and Pakistan in the Best Practice Transfers category.
The award programme is jointly managed by UN-HABITAT and Dubai Municipality.
“These awards are a very valuable means of recognizing excellence, promoting learning and sharing best practices,” said Inga Bjork-Klevby, Deputy Executive Director of UN-HABITAT. “This year, the award ceremony is held at a time the world is going through the worst economic crisis in living memory. If we do not manage it better while we still can, especially the urban part of it in which most of us live, we will lose the battle against climate disruption as well. This is why we so value Dubai’s continued commitment to the cause of sustainable human settlements.”
Engineer Hussain Nasser Lootah, Director General of Dubai Municipality, said: “This is part of the continuing pursuit of the UAE to contribute to a descent life and seamless access to better living conditions for all humanity regardless of gender, religion or nation.” He said seventh Dubai International Award for Best Practices was marked by an exceptional competition of 500 submissions from 65 countries covering three fields.
The technical advisory committee made a great effort to shortlist the best 112 practices out of them, from which the international jury selected the 12 winning practices. Since 1995 the award has attracted over 4000 practice from 140 countries.”
This Dubai awards were started by the late Sheikh Maktoum bin Rashid Al Maktoum in 1995 to recognize and enhance awareness of outstanding and sustainable achievements in improving the living environment as per the criteria established by the Second United Nations Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat II) in Istanbul in 1996, and the Dubai Declaration.
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