MMC Readout: City Leadership on Migration at World Urban Forum 12

In November 2024, the Mayors Migration Council (MMC) attended the twelfth session of the World Urban Forum (WUF12) in Cairo, Egypt, the United Nations’ premier global conference on sustainable urbanization. While there, the MMC team led panel discussions on climate migration, safe and orderly migration pathways, and urban inclusion.

Here is a summary of the MMC’s engagement at WUF12, including key moments for MMC mayors and highlights from MMC-led events.

Municipal Finance for Migrants and Refugees

• The MMC convened city leaders from Ramallah, Palestine and Amman, Jordan grantees of the Global Cities Fund for Migrants and Refugees (GCF) – to exchange learnings from their GCF projects and discuss the future of localizing migration finance. Through the GCF, Ramallah and Amman are rehabilitating public parks to make them more climate-resilient and accessible for refugee children and their caregivers. 
• At the meeting, Mayor Issa Kassis of Ramallah, Palestine, said, “The benefit of Ramallah’s GCF grant is getting recognition. It’s not just about the finance but also for cities to gain international partnership.”
• The MMC Director of City Practice Samer Saliba met with MMC Leadership Board member Mayor Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr of Freetown, Sierra Leone, to discuss the legacy of Freetown’s GCF project and the role of innovative financing models in boosting local action on migration. Through the GCF, Freetown created 40 waste management enterprises led by young migrants in 2022. Thanks to a revolving fund model, the project is still active today. 
• The MMC, in partnership with the International Rescue Committee and Center for Global Development, hosted a panel discussion titled, “Supporting the Integration of Refugees in Cities.” During the panel, Mayor Wilson Sanya of Koboko, Uganda, said, “Mayors must be at the center [of refugee inclusion], not on the sidelines.”
• The European Commission’s Vittorio Capici backed up this call to invest in cities as safe havens for refugees and said, “Investing in a camp is like paying rent. Investing in a city is like having a mortgage.”
• At a panel discussion titled “Boosting the Localization of the Sustainable Development Goals to Propel Transformative Change,” representatives from the UN Joint Sustainable Development Goal (
  SDG) Fund and USAID highlighted their efforts to mobilize funding to local and regional actors accelerating key transitions through the Local2030 Coalition. The Fund has already invested $79 million in innovative policy solutions to localize the SDGs and recently launched an SDG Localization Marker to improve accountability in implementing the localization agenda.
• Cities Alliance and the European Union launched “Supporting Urban Integration of Displacement-Affected Communities” (SUIDAC), an ambitious €30 million, four-year program that will channel funding directly to nine cities in Sub-Saharan Africa to implement sustainable development programs for displaced communities.
  
  

Migration Pathways

• The MMC, in partnership with the UN Development Programme, International Organization for Migration (IOM), and United Cities and Local Governments, hosted a panel discussion titled “Building Inclusive Migration Pathways to Drive Sustainable Urbanization.” The panel convened UN agencies, mayors, and civil society changemakers to highlight the different roles cities can play—as implementers, innovators, and advocates—to expand migration pathways.  
• IOM Director General Amy Pope opened the panel calling on the audience to “harness the power of migration to build cities that are inclusive, resilient, and sustainable, where everyone has the opportunity to flourish.”
• During the panel, MMC City Practice Lead Helen Yu shared examples of MMC cities such as Medellín, Colombia and Accra, Ghana that have taken creative approaches to addressing pathways challenges and said, “Resourcing city governments is critical to ensuring cities can play a role in implementing or creating pathways for migrant communities, be they newcomers or longtime residents.”
• Using Ramallah’s GCF project as an example, Mayor Issa Kassis of Ramallah,Palestine, emphasized a people-centered and care-oriented approach to pathways during his intervention and said, “Trust cities. Partner with cities. Invest in cities.”

Climate Migration

• MMC City Practice Lead Helen Yu spoke on a panel titled “Urban Planning and City Solutions for Climate Mobility,” which convened city governments, academics, and city networks to discuss opportunities and challenges for city action at the nexus of climate change, migration, and urbanization. During the panel, Yu emphasized the importance of letting cities take the lead on climate migration and said, “From incubating green jobs for migrants and refugees in Nairobi to working with at-risk communities to new, climate-resilient neighborhoods in Beira, when you invest in cities they invest in people.”
• Representatives from the cities of Amman, Jordan and Ramallah, Palestine participated in a panel discussion co-hosted by C40 Cities titled “Navigating the Polycrisis: Evidence-Based Policy for Resilient Cities,” where they emphasized the importance of including migrants and refugees in city planning and climate adaptation policies.  

Migrant and Refugee Children and Caregivers

• MMC Leadership Board member Mayor Yvonne Aki-Sawyerr of Freetown, Sierra Leone, spoke on a panel titled “Young Minds, Big Ideas. Accelerating Youth-Led and Localized Climate Action in Urban Africa,” where she highlighted the role that youth, including migrants in informal settlements, are playing in delivering a just green transition.
• At a panel titled “It Starts with Children – Local Actions for Inclusive Urban Futures,” the lead for GCF project in Amman, Jordan Sajeda Alnsour, delivered an intervention from the floor. She highlighted how Amman’s GCF project is creating new public spaces open to both refugees and Jordanian children and said, “We, as a city, believe that children are our most precious resource, and we must invest in them.”