Women in developing world cities face major challenges including underrepresentation in leadership, barriers to economic opportunity, heavy unpaid care burdens, lack of access to infrastructure and services, and vulnerability to violence and harassment. With over 50% of the urban population being women, gender inequality in cities persists. Women hold only 26% of parliamentary seats globally, just 5% of mayorships, and 22.6% of ministerial positions. The economic gender gap won't close for 265 years at today's pace. Discriminatory laws, attitudes, and practices exclude women from leadership.

Those facing intersectional bias are especially impacted. Women's safety in public spaces is also a major issue, with high rates of harassment and violence reported. Women rely more on public transit and make more daily trips, yet inadequate planning and financing leaves 700 million urban residents lacking sanitation and 156 million without clean water - affecting women and marginalized groups most. Bridging the urban gender divide is crucial and urgent.

Building on UN-Habitat and UNCDF’s Prior Experience:
Women-Led Cities is affiliated with UN-Habitat’s global flagship initiative SDG Cities, and UNCDF’s IncluCity project. SDG Cities aims to support 1000 cities in accelerating their achievement of SDGs, and having a positive impact on one billion lives, by offering systematic approaches to support cities in becoming sustainable and resilient. This includes providing digital tools and a technical support structure to aid cities to:

● work with communities and local stakeholders to collect data across key domains of the SDGs;
● develop inclusive, evidence-based vision and strategies to advance the SDGs locally, with an emphasis on reducing inequality and leaving no one behind;
● strengthen urban management systems, including planning, governance, revenue and service delivery; and,
● identify investment priorities that can drive local transformation for the SDGs and connect with sources of investment through a Cities Investment Facility

Contributing to a vision of a world where at least 50% of leaders at all levels are women and where gender-based violence is history, Women-Led Cities presents a strategic opportunity to form a grand, multi-stakeholder coalition to promote women in leadership and expand effective impact investments and gender transformative financing in cities. It provides a crucial space for the engagement of women- led businesses, civil society and the private sector together with female mayors and local leaders, to promote an effective and ambitious gender responsive action agenda for cities..

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