Tunisia Sees World Urban Forum as Opportunity to Showcase Urban Experience

Majdi Frihi, Project Manager at ONU-Habitat Tunisia, believes that Tunisia's participation in the 13th World Urban Forum (WUF13) in Baku is a strategic opportunity to highlight the country's experience in urban planning, housing, and integrated development. In an interview with La Presse, he calls for a broader mobilization of institutions, cities, and the private sector in Tunisia to strengthen the country's presence on the international urban scene.

The Role of the World Urban Forum in International Debates on Cities and Urbanism

The World Urban Forum is one of the most important global platforms dedicated to urban issues. It is not just an institutional space, but a real exchange platform for experiences, good practices, and expertise among governments, cities, international organizations, civil society, and private actors.

The forum allows for the opening of political dialogues around global urban challenges: housing, mobility, public spaces, climate change, urban resilience, and social inclusion. What is particularly important about this forum is that it gives a voice to cities, local authorities, and citizens. Participants come to share their problems, but also the concrete solutions they have tested and which have given positive results.

Evaluating Tunisia's Participation in WUF13

Tunisia was well represented during this session. There was an important and active Tunisian delegation, including the Minister of Equipment and Habitat, who spoke on behalf of Tunisia during various international meetings and discussions.

As the ONU-Habitat Tunisia office, we participated in several workshops, dialogues, and thematic sessions. We also presented several projects developed in Tunisia in the fields of urban planning, housing, and integrated development.

This participation allowed us to show that Tunisia has a real experience in urban development, particularly in integrated urban projects. Since the 1990s, Tunisia has developed an integrated approach to urban design that remains an important experience to be valued at the international level.

The Strengths of Tunisia's Urban Experience

Tunisia has a rich and diverse experience in several areas related to housing and urban development. We have implemented urban rehabilitation projects, social housing programs, rural habitat improvement projects, and important experiences in public space management.

The Tunisian approach is historically based on an integrated vision of urban development, which was widely highlighted during this edition of WUF13.

The Need for Innovation

Today, the challenge for Tunisia is to go further in valuing this experience with a more innovative dimension. It's not just about presenting what has been done, but also about learning from international experiences, exchanging with cities facing similar challenges, and integrating new technological and environmental approaches.

Why Innovation is Essential

Because urban challenges are evolving very quickly. Today, cities must face much more complex problems than before: climate change, demographic pressure, mobility, affordable housing, public space quality, or ecological transition.

Tunisia has a solid foundation, but it must now integrate more innovation into its urban policies. This concerns technologies, environmental solutions, new local governance models, or citizen participation.

WUF13 showed that several countries are investing heavily in urban innovation. Tunisia must therefore strengthen its presence in these international debates to share its expertise, but also to benefit from new global experiences.

A Call for Broader Participation

You have launched an appeal for a broader Tunisian participation during the next edition in Mexico. Why?

Because the Tunisian presence in this type of forum should not only concern public institutions. We need a much broader national mobilization.

We hope that during the next session in Mexico, Tunisia will be represented not only by the administration and central authorities, but also by local authorities, municipalities, civil society, experts, and especially the Tunisian private sector.

Tunisia has today companies capable of presenting innovative solutions in the fields of housing, habitat, green spaces, public spaces, or urban technologies.

This is an important opportunity to value Tunisian innovation at the global level.

Key Messages from WUF13

The main message is that cities are now at the heart of global challenges. Housing, sustainable urban development, and quality of life are absolute priorities.

Tunisia has important experiences to share and must continue to be present in these international spaces of dialogue and cooperation.

But we must also prepare for the future now. The next two years should allow Tunisia to strengthen its urban projects, develop new local experiences, and build a strong and structured participation for the next edition in Mexico.

The objective is clear: to make Tunisia's voice heard on the global urban scene and show that our country has solutions, skills, and experience that can inspire other cities and countries.