The program of the event is rich and the participants can choose from many options. In addition to the main plenary discussions and working group meetings to negotiate the text of the Prague Declaration, there is a number of side events and accompanying activities, such as thematic exhibitions.

THE AGENDA can be downloaded HERE

Country and stakeholder statements during the European Habitat

The heads of delegations from the UNECE member states and regional stakeholder representatives will get a chance to present their statement during one of the plenary sessions. Further details are available HERE. Please express your interest to present your statement in advance following the instructions.

Heads of delegations from other states and non-regional stakeholders are also welcomed to express interest for statement. Please note that priority will be given to the member states and regional stakeholders.

Objectives and themes

The theme of the conference is “Housing in Liveable Cities”

The meeting objectives are:

• to identify and solve new and arising challenges through urban agenda,
• to create an official document called “Prague Declaration” the draft of which will be discussed in December 2015 by the plenum of the UNECE Committee on Housing and Land Management,
• to restore the political commitment towards sustainable urban development.

Prague Declaration

This is the official outcome of the conference “European Habitat”, agreed by 56 delegations of the member states of the United Nations Economic Commission for Europe and which will summarize the conclusions of the meeting. It will be a regional contribution to the global conference “Habitat III”.

The first draft of the “Prague Declaration” to be available before the “European Habitat” starts, was prepared by the Bureau of the UNECE Committee on Housing and Land Management and submitted the Committee during its seventy-sixth plenary session in Geneva in December, 2015, where more than 200 representatives of the UNECE Member States, as well as stakeholders, participated. The “Prague Declaration” concept follows the “Geneva UN Charter on Sustainable Housing”, since the Charter had been conceived as a regional contribution to the Habitat III conference. All UNECE Member States, as well as stakeholders, were invited during this plenary session of the Committee to send, by the end of January 2016, their comments and amendments to the draft text. Some of them did. After this inter-governmental and inter-institutional process, the updated version of the “Prague Declaration” draft was prepared by the Czech Republic as a host country as a draft to be submitted to the “European Habitat” regional meeting and to be discussed there in an open and transparent way. Discussions will happen during Working group meetings and are open – anybody can take part and discuss the final wording of the “Prague Declaration”. The Working group discussions will be chaired by the Advisory Board.

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Languages: Three official UNECE languages (English, French, Russian) and Czech as the language of the hosting country.

Partners´ Side Events

The accompanying program will present events that will address eg. a vision of the future city, the historical development of Prague or control management of the city.

MoRD Side Events

Within the program, the Ministry of Regional Development organises also an informal meeting of the Visegrad Group ministers on housing policy in relation to senior citizens. Other events will concern the role of the European Structural Funds and tourism development in cities.