We are looking for contributions from colleagues around the world working on territorial approaches and urban-rural linkages to share relevant thematic articles, stories, projects done, national/sub-national government initiatives (including laws or policies), innovative approaches, data, photos, maps, tools, and methodologies in the past ten years. This is towards UN-Habitat led initiative to develop a report on the Global state of urban-rural linkages 2023, to contribute to the reporting at the UN-Habitat Assembly. During the previous UN-Habitat assembly in 2019, a resolution “Enhancing urban-rural linkages for sustainable urbanization and human settlements” was adopted as a basis for implementing the Urban-Rural Linkages: Guiding Principles and framework for action (URL-GP). The aim of the report is thus, to take stock of the efforts in the past ten years by UN-Habitat, partners and member states in promoting the territorial approaches and improving urban-rural linkages. The report will also devise forward looking strategies to address the challenges while enhancing the opportunities thereof.

Since the development of the URL-GP began in earnest in January 2018 a hallmark of the effort has been the collaboration and teamwork within UN-Habitat and partners. This collaboration began with drafting tools, continued with piloting in selected countries and co-organizing numerous events including expert group meetings and consultations, two international conferences on URL, joint papers, newsletters, compendia of case studies and global webinar dialogues just to mention a few. Inter-institutional collaboration is at the heart of the URL programme. An inclusive action-learning approach has come to define the work on urban-rural linkages as well as the subject matter itself, sharing good practices and advocating together for improved urban-rural linkages and territorial approaches towards sustainable urbanization and development.