PARTICIPATED IN THE VIRTUAL DEBATE SESSION ON “FINANCIAL FRAMEWORK: WITH WORLD PARTICIPATION ON GLOBAL CHALLENGES"
Through my work at the Urban Economy Forum (UEF) (https://www.ueforum.org/), a Toronto (Canada)-based organisation partnering with the United Nations (UN) system, I had the opportunity and honour to participate in a virtual debate session on June 17th 2021 titled “Financial Framework: with World Participation on Global Challenges”.
The session was jointly organised by UEF and Urban + Futures (U+F) (https://www.urbanplusfuture.com/) an organisation that is also based in Toronto (Canada), envisioning on pioneering a development platform for housing in Canada and the World in alignment to Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) with sound and sustainable financial strategies.
U+F had articulated the primary focus of the virtual debate to be the discussing of the means in which financial resources can be provided to cities and countries to accelerate the realisation of SDGs through the guidance of sustainable models.
Speakers in attendance were a cohort of policymakers, academics and town mayors, most of whom being based in Canada, with me being the sole speaker based in Australia.
The session was moderated by Alex Venuto of UEF. The following, who are members of U+F’s Senior Advisory Board, participated in this session as speakers:
Jose Etcheverry, York University Co-Chair, Sustainable Energy Initiative (SEI) Director
Eleanor Mohammed, Principal at Strategic & Resilient Together President, Commonwealth Association of Planners
Camilla Ween, Loeb Fellowship at Harvard University & Director at Goldstein Ween Architects
Anantha Krishnan, Secretary General of UEF
In addition to the aforementioned U+F’s Senior Advisory Board speakers, there were several other speakers who participated at the virtual debate They comprised of the following attendees:
Reza Pourvaziry, Chair of UEF
Rebecca Alty, Mayor of City of Yellowknife, Canada
Fazileh Dadvar, Professor of Geography, Women Study,Secretariat of Academic Platform, UEF
Massoud Ghandchi, President and Founder of Ghandchi Organization
Kunal Kirpalani, Founder & Principal at Thoth Impact Advisory – who has since then been officially appointed Advisor to UEF (as of September 3rd 2021)
Jason Gangaram, Campus Director at CDI College
John Palmer, Professor, the department of Economics, Western University
Delia Reiche, Development Liaison, County of Brant, Past President of Economic Developers of Ontario & Member of UEF
U+F recently published an article on their website detailing the key highlights from the debate from the debate. My primary verbal inputs for the debate, which were pertaining to innovative financial instruments, in particular Social Impact Bonds (SIBs) and Green Bonds, in the context of financial frameworks, are elucidated in the fifth paragraph in the section “Key highlights from the debate” in this article.
The article is appended below for your leisurely perusal.
It was an honour to have participated in this virtual debate with such an esteemed virtual congregation of policymakers, academics and town mayors. I personally learnt a lot from all of them on the subject matter.
