The Ninth Session of the World Urban Forum (WUF9) concluded in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia on Feb 13.

Themed Cities 2030, Cities for All, the week-long event focused on the implementation of the New Urban Agenda adopted in Habitat III.  

Mr. Liu Baochun, Director General of the Guangzhou Foreign Affairs Office, led a working group to attend the forum and held dialogues with experts and professionals.

Among them were Ms. Maimunah Mohd Sharif, UN-Habitat Executive Director; Mr. Nicholas You, Director of International Programs and Cooperation of Guangzhou Institute for Urban Innovation; Mr. Octavi de la Varga, Secretary General of METROPOLIS; Ms. Bernadia Irawati Tjandradewi, Secretary General of the United Cities and Local Governments Asia Pacific (UCLG-ASPAC); Ms. Monika Zimmerman, Deputy Secretary General of ICLEI; Mr. Kevin Austin, C40's Deputy Executive Director, and Mr. Li Zhijian, President of the Asia-Pacific Innovation Economic Research Institute (China).

Mr. Liu Baochun, Director General of the Guangzhou Foreign Affairs Office, and Ms. Maimunah Mohd Sharif, UN-Habitat Executive Director, exchange views on Guangzhou's multilateral cooperation and the Guangzhou Award during the Ninth Session of the World Urban Forum (WUF9) held in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

They discussed how to further improve Guangzhou's global exposure as well as that of the Guangzhou International Award for Urban Innovation (Guangzhou Award), now in its fourth cycle, enhance multilateral cooperation between Guangzhou and other cities, and expand channels to facilitate multilateral exchanges.

The Guangzhou city also held a workshop "Urban Innovation in Implementation of the Global Agendas" in contribution to "Listen to Cities room/Local Action" of WUF9. The online publication of Urban Innovation and the online registration system of Guangzhou Award 2018 were co-launched by Mr. Octavi de la Varga and Mr. Liu Baochun during the workshop. The city also displayed an exhibit of the Guangzhou Award.