One big step forward in this program is a planning meeting where grassroots women leaders from the Huairou Commission will participate: Designing Safe Cities with Women and Girls: Planning for Success Stakeholders Planning Meeting, from July 5th-9th, 2011, in Cairo Egypt.

Over the last several years, grassroots groups in the Huairou Commission have demonstrated the effectiveness of their bottom-up strategies by identifying the causes of insecurity in their communities, placing their issues on the agendas of local government, and empowering women to enter into decision-making positions. Leaders from the Philippines, Peru, Kenya and Jamaica from the Huairou Commission network will be participating in this conference. The team will continue the work by supporting five cities around the world to implement this project.

The meeting will be comprised of UN Women regional office representatives, the five cities' government officials, UN Habitat, Women in Cities International, and Women and Habitat Network of Latin America, among others. Participants will exchange ideas and information to advance project designs of the key safe cities partner projects in Cairo, Kigali, New Delhi, Quito and Port Moresby. The meeting will offer current knowledge, practices and tools, to examine what works and where, and how to analyze change and success. Finally the meeting will provide an interactive space for global and national safe cities stakeholders for strategic discussions about their commitments to safe cities that are gender inclusive and how this work
can be taken to scale.