During the ongoing seventh session of the World Urban Forum in Medellin, ISOCARP was elected to lead two important groupings related to UN-HABITAT. Vice President Shipra Narang Suri was elected co-Chair of the World Urban Campaign (www.worldurbancampaign.org), a platform that brings together a wide range of organisations representing professionals, civil society, the private sector, and other groups interested in urban issues. This is also the primary forum to carry the views of these actors into the New Urban Agenda to be drafted by, and adopted during, the HABITAT III conference in 2016.

 At the same time, past President Ismael Fernandez Mejia was elected to chair the Habitat professionals Forum, which is a platform that provides a voice to organisations and networks of professionals who work in areas relating to human settlements development, such as architects, planners, landscape architects, housing planners, surveyors etc.

In addition, ISOCARP continues to play an important role in the development of the International Guidelines on Urban and Territorial Planning (IGUTP), through the participation of many of its members in the Expert Group formed to develop these Guidelines.

 Finally, ISOCARP member and urban planner at ARCADIS, Bert Smolders, is also participating in several key partnership forums at UN-HABITAT. Since 2010, he has been the program manager of the partnership between UN-Habitat and ARCADIS, named the Shelter Program. ARCADIS is also the main financial sponsor of the World Urban Campaign and Bert is member of the Steering Committee. He is also co-chair of the UN-HABITAT Private Partners Group, the group of private companies who sponsor UN-HABITAT.

Leading these bodies at this critical juncture puts ISOCARP in the enviable position of being able to directly influence global agenda-setting in the quest for sustainable and inclusive urban development, and the development of several documents which will guide urban planning, management and governance processes globally over the next two decades.

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The Dialogue on Urban Planning, moderated by ISOCARP Vice-President Shipra Narang Suri, was a super hit at WUF 7 in Medellin – 1000 people attended the really interesting and lively discussion. Watch the recorded event online.