PETALING JAYA: Malaysia launched the Asia-Pacific Urban Agenda Platform in Baku, Azerbaijan, on Tuesday (May 19) to strengthen regional urban cooperation and support the implementation of the New Urban Agenda.
The platform was launched during the opening ceremony of the Malaysia Pavilion at the 13th World Urban Forum. Housing and Local Government Minister Nga Kor Ming led the Malaysian delegation.
Nga said the platform would turn fragmented urban efforts across Asia-Pacific into a structured, action-driven ecosystem. He said it would help cities move from vision to implementation and from dialogue to delivery.
“It unites like-minded Member States to embed the New Urban Agenda (NUA) into the very fabric of national development in all countries,” he said in a Facebook post on Tuesday.
He said the platform was developed through a partnership between the government of Malaysia and UN-Habitat. It was aimed to support the Sustainable Development Goals across 58 Asia-Pacific countries.
Nga said the global housing crisis was affecting nearly 2.8 billion people worldwide. He said rapid urbanisation, climate stress, and widening inequalities required urgent and coordinated global action.
“Let us commit to Human-Centred Urbanism and work collectively to bridge the estimated 5.4 trillion-dollar annual financing gap for climate-resilient infrastructure,” he said.
He said Malaysia had delivered more than 1.1 million affordable homes. He also cited a 77% homeownership rate and more than 115 million trees planted nationwide.
He added that Malaysia would hand over the United Nations-Habitat Presidency to the United Arab Emirates and take the latter’s seat on the UN-Habitat Executive Board next year.
UN-Habitat and the Azerbaijan government co-organised WUF13 from May 17 to 22.
The forum brought together more than 30,000 participants from 180 countries to exchange knowledge, share best practices, and strengthen cooperation on urban challenges.
