News

Welcoming the new year

hnyA new year has dawned upon us. As we embrace this new year, allow us, GLTN Secretariat, to reflect on the fruitful journey we had in 2012.

UN-Habitat recognized the work of the Network by creating the ‘Land and GLTN Unit’ within the Urban Legislation, Land and Governance Branch. The Unit is managing a range of projects including GLTN, the capacity development for land policy in Africa, the land coordination in Kenya, the land and natural resources tenure security for selected IFAD projects.

GLTN Phase 2: The beginning of 2012 year marked the transition into the second phase of our work. Our first five years were full of momentum, successes and lessons – all of which we strive to build on. As a Network of partners, we made it this far because we did not go it alone..

Partnership: As we write this, we are glad to recognise the current 50 partners and 2096 individual members who are our hands and feet, auctioning the promise to promote the secure land and property rights for all.

The Sixth World Urban Forum – Last year in the city of Naples, Italy hosted the premier event on cities organized by UN-Habitat. GLTN events during the Forum were a great success. With the highest number of participants, the GLTN roundtable underlined the importance of making a paradigm shift towards continuum of land rights approach. Enriching presentations made by development partners underscored the work done by many GLTN partners.

Funding – As you are aware, advocating for secure land and property rights for all is no small task. Neither is it cheap. Development partners make our work possible; enabling us to develop and expand our activities. We have the renewed support from UN-Habitat, IFAD and the governments of Norway and Sweden (Sida). We are happy to welcome Cities Alliance and the Land Policy Initiative (LPI) as they join our resourceful team of development partners. We are very grateful to all these organisations that continue to support GLTN.

In conclusion, we invite you to share your news, stories and achievements with us by writing to our communication team via gltn@unhabitat.org. Feel free to log onto www.gltn.net for more information on our work and our projections for 2013. Follow us on Twitter @GLTNnews and get to know what we’re excited about.
Have a happy and prosperous 2013!

GLTN Secretariat