BAKU, Azerbaijan — The 13th World Urban Forum (WUF13) officially commenced here today, shattering previous attendance records and establishing itself as the largest global gathering on sustainable development ever convened by UN-Habitat.

Moderated by Nadira Tuda, the opening press conference outlined an unprecedented mobilization of global leaders, policymakers, and civil society members arriving in the Azerbaijani capital to confront a deepening systemic global housing crisis.
 

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Unprecedented Numbers: WUF13 by the Data

As of May 17, 2026, total registrations for the forum reached a staggering 42,367 participants hailing from 182 countries. The sheer scale of the event was evident on day one, with actual attendance instantly clearing the 21,100 mark. The delegation spans the entire spectrum of global governance, including heads of state, ministers, mayors, academics, and grassroots civil society leaders.

At the heart of the forum is the Global Urban Expo, a massive collaborative footprint structured as follows:

Metric	Expo Details
Total Footprint	35,000 square meters
Total Pavilions	122 pavilions hosting 260 organizations
Civil Society	136 representing organizations
National Governments	41 dedicated state pavilions
Private Sector & Tech	44 entities, including 14 forward-leaning startups

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From Dialogue to Delivery: The UN-Habitat Mandate

UN-Habitat Executive Director Anna Claudia Rosbach opened the briefing with a stark assessment of the modern urban landscape. Refusing to view current urban challenges as isolated incidents, Rosbach framed the situation as a structural, systemic failure in global city governance, planning, and finance.

"Nearly 3 billion people globally face housing inadequacy, over 1 billion live in slums or informal settlements, and 300 million experience absolute homelessness," Rosbach revealed.

Rosbach asserted that housing must be treated as a fundamental human right and the primary entry point for achieving Sustainable Development Goal 11 (SDG 11). She called for a holistic strategy linking housing directly to basic utilities, climate resilience, public transit, and economic mobility.

Moving beyond mere rhetoric, WUF13 features 6 high-level dialogues, over 370 partner events, and operational training ground innovations like the WUF Academy and the Practices Hub. The ultimate roadmap of the convention will be codified in the upcoming Baku Call to Action, signaling a hard shift from policy ambition to tangible, local implementation.

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The Baku Standard: Host Country Innovations

Anar Guliyev, Chairman of the State Committee on Urban Planning and Architecture of Azerbaijan, noted that hosting WUF13 is the culmination of a domestic framework built through annual National Urban Forums since 2021.

Guliyev highlighted Azerbaijan’s massive domestic urban transformation, specifically pointing to the ongoing post-conflict reconstruction of its liberated Karabakh region. Reconstructed completely from scratch, these areas are being modeled as futuristic blueprints leveraging smart-city principles, green growth, and sustainable architecture.

Azerbaijan is also introducing three major institutional legacies during WUF13:

• The Leader Segment: A historic first for the World Urban Forum, bringing heads of state together into a dedicated space for direct, top-tier political deliberation.

• The Baku Urban Award: Launched in partnership with UN-Habitat to globally recognize outstanding achievements in housing and sustainable urban development.

• ISO 20121 Certification: WUF13 has achieved the international standard for sustainable event management at the national level. Azerbaijan will co-author an operational guide with UN-Habitat based on these "Baku Standards" to guide all future WUF host nations.

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Human-Centric Urbanization

Injecting a philosophical imperative into the conference, Nga Kor Ming, President of the UN-Habitat Assembly and Minister of Housing for Malaysia, reminded delegates that cities are collections of human stories rather than mere concrete and data points.

"While technology can scale information, it cannot scale the human trust and wisdom necessary to build resilient communities," Ming stated, urging global leadership to guide urbanization "with the heart."

Ming concluded by linking the immediate momentum of WUF13 to the broader geopolitical calendar. Outcomes from a high-level ministerial meeting on the New Urban Agenda held just prior to the press conference will feed directly into the upcoming UN high-level midterm review in New York this July.

The mandate for WUF13 remains clear: the international community must move past vague, comfortable platitudes and pivot toward urgent, measurable local impacts.

 

 

 

Compiled by:

Muhoro Pius W.  & Bob Samuel W

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