The President of the United Mexican States, Enrique Peña Nieto, will head the inauguration ceremony of ECLAC’s thirty-sixth session—the most important biennial meeting of this United Nations regional commission—next Tuesday, May 24 at 1:00 p.m.  in the Official Residence of Los Pinos in Mexico City.

The event, which will be held from May 23 to May 27 in the offices of the Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs, will bring together representatives from ECLAC’s 45 member states and 13 associate members and will be attended by more than 30 Ministers and Deputy Ministers of Foreign, Finance, Economy, Production, Trade, Planning, Social Development and Women’s Affairs, among other authorities.

The opening ceremony will include the special participation of Federica Mogherini, the European Union’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy; Paola Bustamante, Peru’s Minister of Development and Social Inclusion; Claudia Ruiz Massieu, Mexico’s Foreign Affairs Minister; and Alicia Bárcena, Executive Secretary of the Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC).

Over the meeting’s five days, ECLAC will present its activities report and will offer to governments a reflection on development strategies in the context of the 2030 Agenda commitments and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)—part of the position document Horizons 2030: Equality at the Centre of Sustainable Development, which will be released at the gathering.

The event will also bring together researchers and scholars, officials from at least 23 intergovernmental bodies (that are specialized and from the United Nations system), and more than 130 representatives from nearly 60 civil society organizations.

Mexico is a founding member of ECLAC and since June 1951 it has hosted one of ECLAC’s Subregional Headquarters, which includes Central American countries and Mexico. This will be the sixth time that this country serves as the venue for a session: 1951, 1965, 1986, 1987 (Extraordinary Conference), 2000 and 2016.

The complete program of ECLAC’s thirty-sixth session, along with general information about the meeting and a registration form for participants and journalists, is already available on the gathering’s special Web site: http://periododesesiones.cepal.org/36/en.

You can follow all the details of the meeting on social media using the hashtags #Horizontes2030 and #Horizons2030.

More information:

• Thirty-sixth session of ECLAC.
• How to follow ECLAC’s session in Mexico.
• Video. ECLAC sessions with equality at the center.

What: ECLAC’s thirty-sixth session.

When: Monday, May 23 to Friday, May 27, 2016.

Who:

Inauguration (Tuesday, May 24 at 1:00 p.m.) in the Official Residence of Los Pinos in Mexico City (Adolfo López Mateos Conference Room):

• Enrique Peña Nieto, President of Mexico.
• Federica Mogherini, European Union’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy.
• Paola Bustamante, Minister of Development and Social Inclusion of Peru.
• Claudia Ruiz Massieu, Mexican Foreign Affairs Minister.
• Alicia Bárcena, ECLAC’s Executive Secretary.

Where: Offices of the Mexican Ministry of Foreign Affairs. Plaza Juárez 20. Piso 1. Colonia Centro, Delegación Cuauhtémoc, Mexico, D.F.

For questions related to press coverage, contact:
 

In Mexico City: María Luisa Díaz de León, Public Information Official, ECLAC’s Subregional Headquarters in Mexico. E-mail: marialuisa.diaz@cepal.org; Telephone: (52 55) 41705665. Cell Phone: (5255) 5416 9297.

In Santiago, Chile: Félix Ibáñez, Officer-in-Charge of ECLAC’s Public Information Unit. E-mail: prensa@cepal.org; Telephone: (56) 22210 2040. Cell Phone: (569) 7 967 8306.