The various countries all over the world have celebrated the UN Habitat day on the month of October.  The UN-Habitat's Cities and Climate Change Initiative (CCCI) seeks to enhance the preparedness and mitigation activities of cities in developing and least developed countries. It emphasises good governance, responsibility, leadership and practical initiatives for local governments, communities and citizens. Building on UN-HABITAT's long experience in sustainable urban development, the Cities and Climate Change Initiative helps counterparts to develop and implement pro-poor and innovative climate change policies and strategies. CCCI also is developing a suite of tools to support city-leaders and practitioners in addressing the impact of climate change (adaptation) and to help reduce greenhouse gas emissions (mitigation).  To these ends UN-HABITAT is working closely with a diverse range of partners: donors, governments at all levels, other UN agencies, non-governmental organizations (NGOs), community-based organizations, institutions of research and higher learning, capacity building and training agencies, land and property organizations, and private sector entities, among others.

At the local forefront, the UN-HABITAT Mongolia kicked off the activity with conference on “Sharing Session on Climate Change Initiatives in Mongolia” last October 3, 2011 at Ulaanbaatar Hotel.  The program strives to help city of Ulaanbaatar in developing strategies and programs to address climate change, raise awareness and to help counterparts to build the capacities needed to enable city and local governments to address climate change effectively.  Various topics were presented from the international and local agencies.  The State Secretary, Mr. N. Batsuuri of the Ministry of Nature, Environment and Tourism graced the occasion.  The message of the UN Secretary General on World Habitat Day was read by Ms. Eden P. Garde, UN-Habitat Mongolia Programme Manager.  A video message presentation by Dr. Joan Clos, Undersecretary General of the UN, and Executive Director of UN-Habitat was also shown.
The plenary session presented and discussed the following topics; National Strategy on Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation in Mongolia was presented by Dr. G. Sarantuya, Director o the Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology, UN-Habitat Cities in Climate Change Scoping Study: Ulaanbaatar City Case was discussed by Dr. R. Oyun, Team Leader of UN-Habitat Climate Change Scoping Study, Ms. J. Munkhzul, Member of UN-Habitat Climate Change Scoping Study presented the Unur Area Food Vulnerability Assessment, the preview of the Eko-town “Berlin” in Ulaanbaatar City concept  was presented by Ms. Ruth Erlbek, Programme Leader, GIZ, Dr. B. Bunchingiv, Rural Development Specialist of UNDP Environment Team discussed the UNDP Interventions and Strategy on Climate Change, the UN-Habitat International Consultant Mr. Subhash Monga gave an overview of the International Practices for Climate change Adaptation and the Climate Change Projection and Extremes in Mongolia under Greenhouse as Scenarios was presented by Dr. P. Gomboluudev, Scientific Secretary of the Institute of Meteorology and Hydrology. 
The participants to this event came from different international agencies, NGO, city government, government agencies, and academe and from the private sectors.  The Raffles Institute International as one of the invitees was represented by Mr. Jimmy Esplanada, Senior Business Lecturer, Mr. Eleuterio Bernardo, Professor, and Mr. Ronaldo Baya-on, English Language Lecturer. 
It was concluded among the participants and paper presenters that the success of adaptation critically depends on the availability of necessary resources, not only financial, but also knowledge, technical capability, institutional resources and tools.

Contributed by:
Mr. Eleuterio Bernardo, PhD
Mr. Jimmy Esplanada, MBA