Global Agenda Council
on Urbanization
Issue Overview
The world is currently witnessing an unprecedented spurt of urbanization: while the period
between 1950 and 1975 saw population growth evenly divided between the urban and rural
areas, the balance has tipped dramatically towards urban growth in subsequent decades. Today,
50% of the world’s population lives in cities, and it is anticipated that 70% will by 2050.1
While urbanization is occurring worldwide, the trend is most significant in places that are the
least equipped to cope. While many megacities will emerge, the bulk of new urban growth will
occur in smaller settlements that lack the institutional, legal and financial frameworks to pay for
infrastructure. They will consequently have less capability to be resilient in the face of natural
disasters.
As a result, innovative governance and financing structures are needed to catalyse more efficient
infrastructure and housing development and to improve resilience. To accommodate demand,
researchers anticipate that the built environment of today will need to expand by a city equivalent
to the size of Greater London every month for 40 years.2
Yet providing infrastructure is only part of the solution. How the new urban fabric is laid out has
a lock-in effect that shapes resource consumption patterns as well as health and economic
dynamics for generations. Thus, institutionalizing sustainable urban development models and
land-use policies are equally essential steps for managing urbanization.
In the midst of urbanization, the field of “smart cities” is emerging. It is drawing new sectors
to the urban sphere and offers promise in generating solutions to urban challenges through
information and communications technology applications. Thus far smart cities projects have
focused predominantly on developed cities; it remains to be seen how smart city concepts can
be scaled up in fast-urbanizing regions.
Did You Know?
—— China estimates that 400 million additional people will move to its cities in the next 30 years.3
—— It took India nearly 40 years to add 230 million urban residents, but it will take only half that
time to add another 250 million.4
—— Fewer than 35% of the cities in developing countries treat wastewater, and half of all solid
waste within most cities in low- and middle-income countries is not collected. Most of this
deprivation is concentrated in urban slums.5
Further Resources
Calendar
“Urban Anthologies: Learning from Our Cities”.
World Economic Forum:
http://senseable.mit.edu/wef/, 2012
1 October 2012, World Habitat Day
Urbanization Knowledge Partnership, World Bank:
http://www.urbanknowledge.org/
6-9 October 2012, Meeting of the Minds, San
Francisco, USA
8-10 October 2012, 6th Urban Research and
Knowledge Symposium, Barcelona, Spain
March 2013, China Centre for Urban Development
& World Economic Forum Urban Development
Meeting, Shanghai, People’s Republic of China
1
“Global Report on Human Settlements 2009: Planning Sustainable Cities”. UN-HABITAT, http://www.unhabitat.org/pmss/
listItemDetails.aspx?publicationID=2831, 2009.
2
“Urban Planning for City Leaders”. UN-HABITAT, http://www.unhabitat.org/pmss/listItemDetails.
aspx?publicationID=2831http://www.unhabitat.org/pmss/listItemDetails.aspx?publicationID=3385, 2012.
3
Riggs, Trisha. “Finding Certainty in Uncertain Times: ULI Senior Resident Fellows Look Ahead”. Urbanland, http://
urbanland.uli.org/Articles/2010/Fall10/Certainty, 12 October 2010.
4
“India’s Urban Awakening: Building inclusive cities, sustaining economic growth”. McKinsey Global Institute, http://www.
mckinsey.com/insights/mgi/research/urbanization/urban_awakening_in_india, April 2010.
5
“Global Report on Human Settlements 2009: Planning Sustainable Cities”. UN-HABITAT, http://www.unhabitat.org/pmss/
listItemDetails.aspx?publicationID=2831, 2009.
Abha JoshiGhani, Director,
Thematic
Knowledge
and Learning,
World Bank,
Washington DC
The current design and
planning practices for
cities are rooted in the
19th century. Hugely
successful in their time,
these 19th-century
models are no longer the
best solution, and in fact
have become part of the
problem. The world is
now a lot more crowded
and complex and
requires more efficient,
longer-term solutions for
servicing urban areas.
Global Agenda Council
on Urbanization
Members
*Abha Joshi-Ghani, Director,
Thematic Knowledge and Learning,
World Bank, USA
*Chan Heng-Chee, Ambassador-atLarge, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of
Singapore
*Adele Naudé Santos, Architect,
Urban Designer and Dean, MIT School of Architecture and Planning,
USA
*Rob Adams, Director, City Design,
City of Melbourne, Australia
*John Alschuler, Chairman, HR&A
Advisors, USA
*Samer I. Asfour, Director,
Government Sector for Emerging
Markets; Director, Thought
Leadership and Research, ME Public
Sector Institute; Middle Market
Leader, Iraq, PwC, Jordan
Charles Doyle, Chief Marketing
Officer, Jones Lang LaSalle, United
Kingdom
Gordon Feller, Director, Urban
Innovation, Cisco Systems Inc., USA
Edward Glaeser, Professor of
Economics, Harvard University, USA
*Felipe Kast Sommerhoff,
Presidential Delegate for Chilean
Reconstruction, Ministry of Housing
and Urbanism, Chile
*Konrad Otto-Zimmermann,
Secretary-General, ICLEI – Local
Governments for Sustainability,
Germany
*Fahd Al Rasheed, Chief Executive
Officer and Member of the Board,
King Abdullah Economic City, Saudi
Arabia
Paul M. Romer, Professor of
Economics, NYU Stern School of
Business, USA
Melanie Walker, Deputy Director,
Special Initiatives, Bill & Melinda
Gates Foundation, USA
*Mats Williamson, Executive
Vice-President, Skanska AB,
Sweden
*Scot Wrighton, City Manager,
Lavasa Corporation Limited, India
*Carlo Ratti, Director, SENSEable
City Laboratory, MIT – Department of
Urban Studies and Planning, USA
*Confirmed participation in the Summit on the Global Agenda 2012
Council Insights
The Global Agenda Council on Urbanization aims to advance the
international dialogue on urbanization by placing a lens on four
issues: removal of disparity between urban citizens; discovery of the
best practices being followed to proactively address the concerns
of ageing populations in cities; creation of “innovation infrastructure”
to support entrepreneurship and job creation; and the harnessing of
informality for greater prosperity.
The relevant projects include:
—— The “Future of Urban Development Initiative”, which provides
a neutral, third-party setting for ministers, mayors, the private
sector and experts to jointly think through the major urban
challenges of the 21st century and accelerate the transition
to innovative urban development models. The core activity of
the initiative is for the multistakeholder Steering and Advisory
Boards to work hand-in-hand with select Partner Cities around
the world to build strategies to meet specific urban challenges in
those cities, and catalyse collaborative action.
—— “Connected World: Transforming Travel, Transportation and
Supply Chains”, which seeks to develop scenarios to provide
an industry perspective on how the travel and transportation
ecosystem may transform under the influence of changes in the
macro-environment (changing customer needs, new mobility
frontiers, technological developments and so on) by 2025 and
beyond. It also looks at the implications of change for industry
players and policy-makers.
—— The “Strategic Infrastructure Initiative”, which aims to accelerate
the implementation of critical economic infrastructure projects in
countries worldwide. The initiative provides insights to nationallevel governments on two fundamental questions: how they
should prioritize projects to create the greatest impact in terms
of economic growth, social uplift and sustainability; and once
the projects are selected, how they should prepare, procure
and deliver assets most efficiently and effectively. The initiative
has worked with the governments of Panama, Colombia and
Ethiopia, among others.
Ageing
Population
Growth
Design &
Innovation
India
South-East
Asia
Data-Driven
Development
China
Fragile
States
Urbanization
Infrastructure
Emerging
Multinationals
New
Energy
Architecture
Climate
Change
Personal
Transportation
Systems
Catastrophic
Risks
Contact Information
Research Analyst: Lina Boren, Global Agenda Councils, [email protected]
Council Manager: Robin Ried, Associate Director, Head of Urban Development,
[email protected]
Forum Lead: Martina Gmür, Senior Director, Head of the Network of Global
Agenda Councils, [email protected]