Washington, DC - Ambassador Nancy Stetson, Special Representative for Habitat III, will travel to Quito, Ecuador October 14-20 to serve as Deputy Head of Delegation for the United States to the United Nations Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development, Habitat III. The United States Delegation will be led by Secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Julian Castro.

Habitat III will be the first time in 20 years that the international community has come together to reflect on and plan for the mega trend of rapid urbanization. Additionally, UN member states will adopt the New Urban Agenda, a vision for sustainable urbanization as well as a new set of agreed, voluntary standards of achievement. The New Urban Agenda is designed to promote creative thinking to improve the way we build, manage, and live in cities in order to create urban areas that are sustainable, inclusive, resilient and safe for all. This agenda also reinforces the crucial linkages between urbanization and the Sustainable Development Goals (the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development), and the Paris Agreement on climate change, among other important shared, global aspirations.