Women and sustainable urbanization

New Urban Agenda, adopted at the UN-Habitat III Conference in Quito, Ecuador in October 2016, underlines the importance of gender equality and the empowerment of all women and girls for readdressing the way cities and human settlements are planned, designed, financed, developed, governed and managed. It stresses the need for gender-responsive urbanization through ensuring women’s full and effective participation and equal rights in all fields and in leadership at all levels of decision-making, decent work and equal pay for equal work and prevention and elimination of all forms of discrimination, sexual harassment and gender-based violence against women and girls in private and public spaces through well-designed networks of safe, accessible, green and quality streets and other public spaces that are accessible to all and free from crime and violence. The proposed event is an occasion to focus during Urban- and Arch-October on women empowerment as indivisible part of sustainable urbanization.