UrbanShift Africa Forum

Name: UrbanShift Africa Forum
Start: 2025-02-17
End: 2025-02-19
Location: Kenya

17 - 19 February 2025

Nairobi, Kenya

Overview

Programme

Event Highlights

Date: 17 to 19 February 2025

Location: UNEP Headquarters, Nairobi, Kenya

Organizers: UN Environment Programme (UNEP), World Resources Institute (WRI), C40 Cities

Hosted in Nairobi, Kenya, from 17 to 19 February, the regional UrbanShift Forum for Africa will bring together cities and stakeholders from Kenya, Sierra Leone, Rwanda, Morocco, Senegal, South Africa, Nigeria, Madagascar, Mali, Congo and many more countries. Participants will represent national and local governments, finance institutions, civil society organisations, academic institutions, and private sector entities focusing on sustainable urban development.

Convened by UNEP and partners, the Forum will serve as a platform for exchanging best practices, fostering collaboration, networking, and advancing climate ambition, commitments, and international agenda targets specific to the African context. With most of the world's projected urban growth expected to occur in Africa, the Forum will focus on resilience, urban planning, and infrastructure development.

Funded by the Global Environment Facility and led by the UN Environment Programme, UrbanShift is working to transform cities for people and planet through sustainable, integrated, zero-carbon urban development.

Registrations for this event are currently closed.

The Forum will feature various sessions, including but not limited to the following:

High-level Opening Ceremony : Welcome remarks followed by an inspiring lineup of speakers who will reflect on the progress made so far and outline the path ahead to create green, resilient, and thriving cities.
Forum Plenary Sessions : A series of carefully curated and impactful sessions on climate science, climate finance, and business engagement, featuring key experts and thought leaders.
Site Visit : Practical demonstration of climate action.
Investors Roundtable : A focused discussion on financing strategies for decarbonising urban energy systems and accelerating financial flows to close the energy infrastructure gap.
Mayoral Gatherings : Gatherings with mayors in the region to discuss priorities and opportunities.
Parallel Sessions : A variety of sessions focused on accelerating the deployment of climate-resilient infrastructure amidst rapid urban growth in Africa, delivered by a wide range of partners.
Networking Opportunities : Engage with peers, experts, and stakeholders during dedicated networking sessions and informal gatherings.

During the Green & Resilient UrbanShift Africa Forum, leaders from across the continent united to learn and share insights on accelerating transformative urban planning approaches—and the finance needed to implement them.

As African cities are set to double in population over the next few decades–and with one in every four people projected to be African by 2050–it’s no exaggeration to say that people working now to advance sustainable and resilient urban planning hold both enormous responsibility and potential. African cities, already facing threats of climate change, must work urgently to build resilience now and into the future. And with 70% of the African population under the age of 30, there is both profound urgency and momentum around securing a sustainable and thriving future for generations to come.

Over the course of a week, the Green & Resilient UrbanShift Africa Forum, hosted by C40 Cities with support from UNEP, WRI and ICLEI, reflected and catalyzed this energy. “We need to deliver infrastructure solutions at a pace that matches our ambition to safeguard our future,” said Mayor of Freetown and C40 Co-Chair Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr. “Our future depends on us. Investing in Africa is investing in a more stable, prosperous, and climate-resilient future for all." Wanjira Mathai, Managing Director for Africa at World Resources Institute, outlined three essential shifts that cities and the people who steward them must make now to ensure resilience. “We need a mindset shift that reveres nature and the role it plays in our cities; we need a policy shift that prioritizes long-term resilience over transient goals; and we need a finance shift that prioritizes innovation and sustainable investment.”