Mr. Herbert Bautista, Mayor, City of Quezon, Philippines
Good morning/afternoon to our distinguished organizers from the Global Forum on Human Settlements (GFHS) and the United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (UNESCAP), the Global One Belt One Road Association (GOBA) and the Better City Institute (BCI), my fellow mayors and colleagues in government service, partners in the private sector, and other stakeholders.
Our program is a response to the Sustainable Development Goal 11 which embodies a commitment to make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable. It is also a response to a challenge that many cities have, that is, the problems on informal settlements.
Out of the Quezon City’s land area of 161 square kilometers, an aggregate area of 6% are occupied by informal settlers. We have about 190,718 informal settler families (or ISFs) of which about 44, 450 families live in danger areas (which means in and along waterways, road right of ways, under transmission lines and above aqueduct right-of-ways.
