The World Urban Forum 4, “Harmonious Urbanization: Challenge of
Balanced Territorial Development,” will take place in Nanjing, China from November 3-7, 2008. The program is organized by United Nations, Habitat to address the pressing problem of rapid urbanization and its impact on communities, cities, economies and world climate.
“With half of humanity already living in towns and cities, it is projected that in the next 50 years, two-thirds of us will be living in towns and cities. A major challenge is to minimize burgeoning poverty in cities, improve the access of the urban poor to basic facilities such as shelter, clean water and sanitation and to achieve environmentally friendly, sustainable urban growth and development”
The Forum was last held in 2006 in Vancouver, BC, Canada, drawing 10,000 professionals from diverse backgrounds including, community activists, non-governmental organizations, community-based organizations, associations, academics, leaders, diplomats, planners and local government representatives. This program previously drew less than 4,500 to Barcelona in 2004. The rapidly-growing attendee base, and high-level participation, make this a premiere global urban planning platform.
A primary track at this upcoming event is Spatially Harmonious Cities (PDF), which aims to assess the role and performance of urban planning to solve sustainable development issues. The preliminary program for this track indicates that some approaches have shown positive impact, but also recognizes that outmoded forms of planning can make problems worse.
The concept of harmonious development that came from the State of the World’s Cities will be explored and will be used to broaden the concept of sustainable urbanization. A Global Report on Human Settlements 2009 (GRHS) will be developed in concert with this Spatially Harmonious Cities Dialogue, and will be published after the event.
