During his keynote speeches; the Acting Director of AME Mr. Juan Carlos Macancela emphasized that “The 2030 vision recognizes collaboration at the level of national and local governments in addition to considering the current challenges in the cities; so that our vision should be aligned for utilization of instruments, tools and guidelines that allows the achievement of a better quality of life for the global population living in cities. To overcome the current challenges, strategic alliances between the public and private sector is necessary for efficiency in administrative and financial management.  I believe UNDP’s MELA training program will be helpful for Local Authorities to encourage and support the development of municipal enterprises to take advantage of capacity and create an ecosystem to attract the private sector that will provide sustainability, resilience and inclusion in the provision of municipal services, under the Win-Win philosophy.”

Mr. Mehmet Duman, Secretary General of United cities Local Governments, Middle East West Asia Section delivered the closing remarks and stressed that  .. “ MELA training was initially a regional initiative that started in Türkiye and was followed by a program in Palestine. Later, the program continued to spread beyond the MEWA Region and started to become a global initiative. The Azerbaijan edition of the training was held with the cooperation of Eurasian section of UCLG, and the Albania edition was held with the cooperation of European section of UCLG. It is a great honor for me to be here today, sharing the same atmosphere with you at the fifth edition of the program.” While thanking the   Association of Municipalities of Ecuador for their great coordination ultimately resulting in the wide participation we have reached today.