Problems facing cities need new thinking, says UN-Habitat boss

In October last year Joan Clos, the 62-year-old, two-time mayor of Barcelona, Spain, became Executive Director of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat).

[caption id="attachment_1561" align="alignnone" width="750" caption="UN-Habit boss Joan Clos tours Kibera slum - Source: Daily Nation"][/caption]

His predecessor, Dr Anna Tibaijuka of Tanzania, had long tried to impress on world leaders the need to reduce by half the number of people living in slums and squatter settlements by 2015, the target date for achieving the UN’s Millennium Development Goals.

It is an ambitious vision because the population of African cities is projected to more than triple over the next 40 years, according to a UN-Habitat report – The State of African Cities 2010.

Those who flock to the continent’s cities in search of work and a better life will continue to swell the already bursting slum populations. And while Habitat’s vision is to create a better urban future for all, there is no doubt Dr Clos has his job cut out for him.

The way he sees it, he has already had an opportunity to become familiar with urban development as a city councillor in the 1980s, mayor in the 1990s and as head of Metropolis, an international network of cities that specifically opened his eyes to the broader global perspectives of urbanisation.

Today, as a UN under-secretary-general, he hopes to develop, together with his team, new strategies for sustainable urbanisation.

Nairobi, the city that hosts his office, is home to a little over three million people, according to the 2009 census, and is projected to receive a million more by the end of the decade.

More than half the world’s population already lives in cities — nearly quintupling the number in the 1950s, according to The Global Report on Human Settlements 2011.

But the the fact remains that come the end of the day, the majority of city workers would rather trek back to their informal settlements than remain in rural areas trying to eke out a living from agriculture.

The allure of the city remains its shiny skyscrapers, better infrastructure and hope for a better tomorrow – even though today, residents face issues of inadequate water and food supply and poor, sometimes inaccessible, healthcare.

So why not develop the rural areas and stem this heavy influx to the cities? According to Dr Clos, that may not be the right solution.

“There is no evidence that we can create a prosperous rural area. In any case, we have no resources to make rural areas as good as the cities,” he said. “The more we entertain the myth of rural richness, the more we delay in getting the solutions for the city.”

The key to sustainable urbanisation, he believes, is for leaders to develop a positive urban policy.

“We should begin with aligning our psychological state of mind in order to stop viewing the city as a liability. We must begin to see the city as an asset for growth and development before we act.”

Dr Clos knows many things about urbanisation and the kind of action that could make it sustainable, however ambitious.

During his tenure as Barcelona mayor from 1997 to 2006, he implemented the design and preparation of the Barcelona@22 Project aimed at renovating the city’s industrial and technological zones.

He spearheaded the additional renovation of some 250 hectares of land in one of the city’s most deprived areas to create social housing, hotels and offices. His bold move earned him a number of awards including, a gold medal from the Royal Institute of British Architects for transforming the city.

And now the challenge he faces is to transform the world’s cities.

“My vision is to promote the rethinking of a city’s capability to be the engine of growth, prosperity and job creation,” he says.

Job creation, he says, is a priority issue for UN-Habitat. Through its youth fund, the agency provides grants of up to $25,000 (Sh2,075,000) every year, for new ideas and solutions for job creation, good governance, adequate shelter and secure tenure.

A graduate in medicine with qualifications and experience in public health administration, Dr Clos is not blind to the health, sanitation and security issues that compromise the benefits of rapid urbanisation.

As informal settlements become more and more congested, the reality of communicable diseases sets in. The fact that informal settlements in a good number of cities around the world make difficult quick access to public services is also worrying.

“Cities, not just in Kenya, have narrow inroads that may not allow for mobility or access by fire brigade vehicles, for example, should a need arise, and yet, there is a regulation prescribing the percentage of land allocated to streets,” he said.

With the continued global rapid rate of urbanisation, more competition over land and land-based resources like water are to be expected. The to-do list of Dr Clos and his team cannot but grow longer.

Source: Daily Nation