On June 16-19, the Global Sustainable Development Congress (GSDC) was held at the Istanbul International Convention & Exhibition Center in Turkey. Co-hosted with Türkiye's Council of Higher Education and convened by Times Higher Education, the congress was held under the theme of “Convening the global sustainability and higher education community”. More than 3,000 experts, scholars, government officials, industry leaders, media and students from all over the world attended the conference, including Erol Özvar, President of the Higher Education Institution in Türkiye, Çetin Ali Dönmez, Deputy Minister of Industry and Technology of Turkey, and Emin Amrullayev, Minister of Education of the Republic of Azerbaijan.

Opening Ceremony of the Congress

Yang Bin, Vice-chancellor of the University Council, Tsinghua University and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Tsinghua SDG Institute, and Zheng Yi, Head of the Office of the SDG Institute, were invited to attend the Congress.

Zheng Yi at the Congress (Third from Left)

On June 17, Resilient cities: Planning and designing communities for sustainable urban growth was moderated by Rika Swanzen, Deputy Dean of Research at the Independent Institute of Education of South Africa. Bora Caldu, Chief Executive Officer of Habitat Association of Turkey, Nurul Diana Intan Zafirah Ishak, Head of Risk and Sustainability at Cyberview in Malaysia, Ayşegül Selışık, Assistant FAO Representative in Türkiye , and Zheng Yi discussed how stakeholders interact with each other on sustainability issues in the urban development process (e.g., human resources development, social equity, etc.) and how to create resilient cities through cross-sectoral cooperation.

For the third consecutive year, Tsinghua SDG Institute has attended the Global Sustainable Development Congress, contributing to international cooperation in higher education and global sustainable development.