AUICK Committee Meetings

Regular Meeting on 25 March 2008

The AUICK Executive Committee held its second regular meeting for FY 2007 at the meeting room of the AUICK Office on Tuesday, 25 March 2008.

In his opening remarks, Dr. Hirofumi Ando, President of AUICK, reiterated that AUICK’s 2004-2007 project had produced excellent results. The Secretariat presented an activity and budget plan for FY 2008, which was unanimously approved.

Suggestions by the committee included:

1. conducting more specific studies for AACs after gathering their requested data;
2. using more international case studies on themes such as slum waste disposal; and
3. coordinating the sharing of such information with Environmental specialists in Kobe, not only AACs.

Lastly, the Secretariat briefed on the outline of the First 2008 Workshop, “Population and Environment Management in Urban Planning - Solid Waste and Greening”, to be held from 28 May to 7 June 2008.

Executive Committee Members

Kojiro Niino (Chair)
  President, Kobe Institute of Urban Research
Shozo Takayose
 Professor Emeritus, Konan University
Isao Mizohashi
  Former Director General, Civic Affairs, Culture and Tourism Bureau, Kobe City Government
Kyoji Ueda
  Director, International Affairs, Culture and Tourism Bureau, Kobe City Government, representing Mr. Shin-ichi Omori, Directoer General, International Affairs, Culture and Tourism Bureau, Kobe City Government
Hirofumi Ando
  President, AUICK
Manabu Shinya
  Executive Director, AUICK

AUICK Secretariat

Nobuyuki Morimoto
  Deputy Executive Director, AUICK

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Annual Meeting on 2-3 September 2007

From 2 to 3 September 2007, the AUICK International Advisory Committee （IAC） held its annual meeting in Kobe.

Dr. Hirofumi Ando, the President of AUICK, welcomed the members of the International Advisory Committee (IAC), especially the two new members, Dr. Lee-Jay Cho and Dr. Mari Simonen.

Under the chair of Dr. Gayl D. Ness, the meeting began by paying tribute to the late Prof. Toshio Kuroda, a founding member of the IAC, highlighting his contributions to the establishment of AUICK together with the late Dr. Rafael M. Salas of UNFPA.

Mr. Manabu Shinya, Executive Director of AUICK, then reported on the activities of the AUICK Strategic Project of 2004-2007.

The vision and leadership of AUICK to undertake activities on urbanization and its related issues was praised. It was also noted that Kobe experiences dealt with in the workshops were useful, and the use of case studies from AACs and the adoption of the Action Plan for the workshops were complimented upon.

AUICK’s agreement with AAC mayors was deemed valuable, especially within the current trend of decentralization of authority.

The outline of the new program proposal for 2008-2011 was then presented.

The new program will pursue the same overall objective to help increase the administrative capacities of nine medium and small sized cities in Asia through (1) training; (2) information collection and dissemination through City-University Partnerships (CUP); (3) mainstreaming of AUICK activities into UNFPA country programs; (4) technical support service from the City of Kobe; (5) South-South cooperation; and (6) closer monitoring.

The program will concentrate on the four key substantive areas of (1) environment protection; (2) population aging; (3) water environment management; and (4) reproductive health and HIV/AIDS, especially among urban poor and youth.

A number of suggestions were made as to the future implementation of the AUICK project:

1. IAC members should be kept involved in various activities of AUICK, in particular the selection and briefing of the workshop participants.
2. Continuous efforts should be made to pursue the linking with the UNFPA country offices and activities carried out nationally, regionally and locally.
3. IAC members could assist in replicating the training workshops at the national level or in other cities.
4. AUICK should continue to intensify efforts to mainstream its activities into the UNFPA country programs, coordinate with United Nations partner organizations, and influence on-going policy dialogues with governments.
5. The AUICK workshops should deal with the main themes of the Millennium Development Goals, and may have focus on the urban poor/slums.
6. AUICK should pay attention to population structural changes.
7. Second-tier workshops (within AACs) could be organized by some AUICK workshop participants with the assistance of one or two experts.

IAC Members

Prem P. Talwar
  Adjunct Professor, School of Public Health, University of North Carolina (India)
Haryono Suyono
  Former Minister Coordinator for People Welfare and Poverty Alleviation (Indonesia)
Lee-Jay Cho
 Chairman, Northeast Asia Economic Forum; Former Director, East-West Center Population Institute (Korea,    Republic)
Krasae Chanawongse
  Founder of the College of Asian Scholars, Former Minister of Foreign Affairs (Thailand)
Mari Simonen
  Deputy Executive Director, United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA)
Gayl D. Ness
  Professor Emeritus, University of Michigan (USA)

AUICK Secretariat

Hirofumi Ando
  President
Manabu Shinya
  Executive Director
Nobuyuki Morimoto
  Deputy Executive Director

New Executive Director

On 1 May 2008, Mr. Toshihiko Ono was inaugurated as the new Executive Director of AUICK. Mr. Ono had previously worked as Director of the Kobe Trade Information Office in Seattle, Manager of the Port and Urban Projects Bureau Marketing Division, and Director of the International Division, International Affairs Office of Kobe City. Bringing his extensive experience in the field of development promotion and international affairs, Mr. Ono hopes to further increase the city of Kobe’s contribution towards the development of the AUICK project.