The Government of the Republic of Serbia will host the Conference at the Serbia Palace in Belgrade on 11 February 2010.

The conference is co-organized by the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister for European Integration, the Ministry of Environment and Spatial Planning and UN-HABITAT, with the support of the Italian Government.

The Conference reflects the Serbian political will of sharing experiences with other European countries on affordable housing policy development and strategic options to better target social inclusion. The Conference aims at confronting different housing policy options and experiences for strengthening affordable housing delivery systems in Serbia.

With an overarching theme of Access to social and affordable housing, the Conference will highlight good practices and challenges in other European countries in terms of housing policy, housing finance systems and strategies for targeting the needs of the low-income families and socially vulnerable groups that represent three main cross-cutting issues that are greatly significant for the housing reform process in Serbia.

The presentations will provide the grounds for open and robust dialogue and discussion on key issues that link to the main scope of the Conference. The opening and technical sessions, together with panels and Q&A sessions will explore the essential connections among these cross-cutting issues aiming at introducing innovative approaches and getting contributions from different perspectives. Best experiences and case studies will be introduced by the speakers as example in practice to confront different policy development options for further development of the social housing in Serbia.

Finally, recommendations will be formulated and thoroughly discussed from different perspectives by all participants in order to develop adequate conclusions for the new housing policy in Serbia.

[ Download here the Agenda of the Conference ]

Bujanovac, 2 December 2009 – Mayors of the 13 Municipalities of the Pčinja and Jablanica Districts of South Serbia signed on 2 December the Letters of Intent for the implementation of the UN Joint Programme “Promoting Peace Building in South Serbia” funded by the Spanish MDG Achievement Fund.

The letters of intent were signed by the UN Resident Coordinator on behalf of UN participating Agencies, and representatives of the Governments of Spain, Switzerland, Sweden and Norway, main supporters of UN joint activities in South Serbia.

The ceremony was held in the presence of the Mr. Milan Markovic, Minister for Public Administration and Local Self Government and President of the Coordination Body for Medvedja, Presevo and Bujanovac, lead partner to the UN participating Agencies in Serbia for the design and implementation of the project.

Following the signing ceremony, the high school children from South Serbia municipalities screened the play “You and I are We” in Albanian, Serbian and Roma languages, which communicated in a very joyful and lively way the strong commitment of south Serbia youth to be part as well as actors in strengthening social cohesion within their interethnic community.

Bringing together several specialized UN Agencies, the Programme “Promoting Peace Building in South Serbia” will be implemented jointly by UN-HABITAT, UNDP, UNICEF, IOM and UNHCR.

The 13 partner Cities/Municipalities are Vranje, Trgovište, Bosilegrad, Vladičin Han, Surdulica, Bojnik, Medveđa, Leskovac, Lebane, Vlasotince, Crna Trava, Preševo and Bujanovac.

[ More news on the Programme “Promoting Peace Building in South Serbia” ]

Photo: Architecture students meet the Peti Park community. M.Keranovic

Belgrade, 20 October 2009 - Within the Framework of Cooperation with the Faculty of Architecture of the University of Belgrade, UN-HABITAT has been engaged in providing professional training on ‘The basics of participatory planning methodology’ to the second year students of the faculty’s master program, enrolled in the design studio “Peti park”.

The design studio course sees the students working on the development of a shared vision and project ideas for the spatial and functional organization of the public park in the neighborhood of ‘Peti Park’ in Belgrade.

The students will be engaged in field work in close collaboration with the community and will develop design tools to ensure the full participation of the individuals and local associations in the development of the projects’ ideas.

UN-HABITAT training provided students with an introduction to Community Participation and Participatory Planning tools, Vision and Visioning processes, Stakeholder Analysis, Conflict Management Strategies and Facilitation techniques, among others.

Belgrade, 15 September 2009 - UN-HABITAT will support community cohesion and inclusive development in thirteen municipalities in South Serbia through the UN Joint Programme “Promoting peace building in South Serbia”. The 2.5 million US Dollars  programme is funded by the Spanish MDG Achievement Fund.

Implementation is foreseen to start within the end of the year and will last two and a half years.

The Programme was formally endorsed on 15 September 2009 in Belgrade with the signatures of the Minister of Public Administration and Local Self Government of the Republic of Serbia, the representative of the Spanish Government, the UN Resident Coordinator and representatives of UN-HABITAT Office in Belgrade and other participating UN Agencies.

In the frame of joint efforts of the UN Country Team in support of the Government of Serbia for the achievement of the MDGs and in preserving peace among interethnic communities living in this part of Serbia, UN-HABITAT will partner with the 13 municipalities to strengthen capacities of local self governments, institutions and civil society to engage in conflict/violence prevention planning through participation, dialogue and partnership for improved safety, and integrating safety concerns within development efforts, fostering long term stability, reintegration and good governance. 

UN-HABITAT will adapt its Safer Cities methodology, already successfully used in other parts of Serbia in the frame of the SIRP Programme, to provide a structured process of capacity building measures to support municipal administrations and civil society partners.  This will help them develop and upgrade strategies and plans, through participation and partnership building (including with police), which will address issues related to safety, conflict and security concerns at local level and integrate them within the development efforts, fostering social cohesion, and conflict management capacities. Vulnerable members of the communities, as well as women, youth and ethnic minorities will be involved from the beginning in the planning process for the development of safety strategies and action plans and benefit of capacity building activities. These partnerships and coalition groups should become formal part of the municipals’ structures by the end of the programme. Small grants will support the implementation of key relevant pilot initiatives through partnerships, as identified by the local communities, targeting the community as a whole, including women, youth, minorities and vulnerable groups.

The MDG Achievement Fund is a United Nations resource that finances and supports national efforts to accelerate progress on the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

The MDG Fund was created in December 2006 and works through the UN in support of national Governments, local authorities and civil society towards: i) Implementing joint programmes that strengthen public policy development and ensure measurable impact on select MDGs; ii) Engaging in advocacy and mobilization efforts that keep the MDGs high on the political agenda; iii) Learning through continuous monitoring and evaluation using these to scale up and inform future action.

The MDG-F supports about 130 joint programmes world wide in the areas of gender equality, youth employment, economic governance, culture and development, conflict prevention, environment, child nutrition and private sector.

Belgrade, 15 June 2009 - On June 1 2009, at the Serbia Palace in Belgrade, the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister for European Integration of the Government of Serbia, through its Social Inclusion and Poverty Reduction Unit, and together with UN-HABITAT organized a national workshop for the presentation of the SILD Settlements and Integrated Local Development Programme in Serbia.

The workshop launched the start of the preparatory phase of the programme financed by the Italian Government and executed by UN-HABITAT in partnership with 11 cities/municipalities in Serbia.
The opening note was given by the Deputy Prime Minister for European Integration at the Serbian Government, Mr. Božidar Đelić.
The workshop was attended by the Head of the Italian Cooperation in Serbia Ms. Anna Zambrano, UN-HABITAT Regional Coordinator Mr. Jean-Yves Barcelo, representatives of the Ministries of Environment and Spatial Planning, of Human and Minority Rights, of Labor and Social Policy, the Standing Conference of Towns and Municipalities, CSOs, the mayors and other representatives of the 11 Cities/Municipalities participating to the Programme, namely Bor, Cacak, Kragujevac, Kraljevo, Leskovac, Nis, Novi Sad, Subotica, Uzice, Valjevo, Vranje.

The workshop presented the results of the Programme formulation process carried out through a wide consultative process and with the strong involvement and contributions of partners and main stakeholders from central and local government institutions.

Designed as a scaled-up follow-up to the previous program in Serbia (SIRP – Settlement and Integration of Refugees Programme), which was also financed by the Italian Government, SILD is a sub-regional programme to be implemented simultaneously in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Albania, aimed at contributing to participatory development processes of integrated and sustainable urban settlements towards inclusive cities in line with and through harmonization with EU standards and practices.

During the consultations with partners and stakeholders, matching needs and opportunities under SILD resulted in the identification of the programme overall objective in Serbia: to support the process of social housing policy reforms under the wider frame of integrated, sustainable and inclusive urban development taking into account EU social cohesion and territorial cooperation agendas.

The contributions of local representatives to the discussion, during the workshop, reiterated the relevance of the approach and the targets of the programme.

Similar presentations of the respective national programme documents and workshops have been already organized in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Albania.

To download the Agenda of the Workshop in English     [ Click here ]
To download the Agenda of the Workshop in Serbian    [ Click here ]
To read more about the SILD Settlements and Integrated Local Development Programme [ Click here ]