Group 1_C | SDG 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities

A Perspective from India

As of today, more than half of the world’s population lives in urban cities, a percentage that is estimated to grow to 60% by 2030. This rise in city dwellers has been fueled by increasing migration and rising populations. This trend towards urbanisation has gone hand in hand with rising demand for basic services, jobs, infrastructure, affordable housing, and increased pressure on the environment. The high concentration of people makes such places particularly vulnerable to natural disasters as well as climate change. Unplanned urban expansion can cause cities to spill beyond their edges and can become a hindrance to development planning. Additionally, urban cities are the main contributors to greenhouse gases that lead to climate change. Nearly half of the population living in the world’s cities breathes air that is 2.5 times more polluted than the acceptable number given by the World Health Organization. The area occupied by cities is 2% of the planet’s land area; however, this is responsible for nearly 80% of the world’s overall energy consumption. Therefore, the impact of other sustainable development goals largely depends on how urban centers and their dwellers transform their lifestyles and adopt sustainable practices.


Building a sustainable city means providing residents with a decent standard of living, regenerating resources without depleting them, and allocating resources for the well being of the inhabitants. This involves combating poverty, upgrading slum settlements, developing green spaces, etc. Since cities aren’t isolated and are constantly interacting with their surrounding regions, they can be a significant potential source for contributing to urban climate change strategies and managing the demand for resources. There are several opportunities at the city level for collaboration between different actors who can impact the planning and implementation of sustainable development goals. 


Relevance of Sustainable Cities in India


Knowing that smart cities are those who are meticulously planned for sustainable development and administration, let’s go into the details of why we need them at this point. Especially in a country like India, with a population of 1.3 billion people. While ~32% of the Indian population lives in urban areas, it has been observed that mass movement of a population segment from rural to urban areas in search of better lifestyle, jobs and opportunities is a constant phenomenon. While this has increased the haphazard urbanization in multiple regions of the country, it has also led to the increasing slum population of the metro cities of India, a very vulnerable segment of the urban population to widespread diseases. Another consequence to note here is the growing traffic congestion which further contributes to the commute time of the working population. Now stating the most apparent, human activities that exploit the environment are yet another cause for concerns and is an adequate reason to promote sustainable cities to reduce the exploitation of nature by humans. 


As urban cities account for 63% of India’s GDP, it’s essential to bring out developments for the above-said issues in the most sustainable way possible. This calls for a complete revamp and sustainable model along the lines of infrastructure, institutional, physical and economic development so that it enables eco-friendly lifestyles and attracts more people towards such models. It also helps improve investments, thus bringing about a cycle of awareness, action and growth in this aspect. The Government of India has taken steps such as the Smart Cities Mission, to promote sustainable cities through innovation and awareness about the impact of human activities on the environment. It also enables the judicious use of technology for a smarter life through the development of local amenities and economic development.



Business Implications and Responses of Sustainable Cities


By the first half of this century, around seventy percent of the global population is estimated to be living in cities, thereby making the goal of sustainable cities and communities as one of the most crucial goals to be achieved. Business in these sustainable cities would require to partner with the stakeholders i.e. government, customers, suppliers, and all other ingredients of the value chain along with civil society organizations to collectively engage in efforts towards achieving ambitious goals of making cities and communities more inclusive, resilient, safe, competitive and most importantly, resource-efficient.


Crucial areas that need attention in achieving the said progress on sustainable cities and communities are :


  1. Understanding what activities need to be curbed and the ones that need to be promoted in order to achieve the goals in the most sustainable way by altering the thought process of approaching solutions.

  2. Developing capacity and skill sets across the stakeholders involved so that they are able to deliver on their targets for developing innovative models and designs to implement sustainability as an important criteria.

  3. For the integrated city infrastructure comprising telecom, residential, energy requirements, commute and travel, financial capital needs to be attracted and secured by raising investor interest in investments in sustainable projects.

  4. Conducting round-robin checks to ensure that the plans are practical and can be implemented with existing technology and resources.


With the power of business and investor inclusion, cities and communities will be able to navigate these challenges and can turn a simple vision into reality and actionable plans. Business can play a very important role in not only providing the crucial technology, services, finance and infrastructure needed to build the sustainable solutions but can contribute to the R&D and the planning and strategy needed to bring about the crucial optimisation needed of the entire urban systems and processes put in place so as the environment is safe, sustainable, disaster-resilient and inclusive for everyone living in it. Cities and communities that involve businesses from the early planning stage of the development process will benefit from their expertise in developing cutting edge and cost effective practical solutions that can be implemented within reasonable time.


There are businesses that took relevant steps towards building more sustainable cities. Mahindra Finance came up with a fixed interest rate housing loan system, which is coupled with life and property insurance that is effective for rural consumers in India. Mahindra was committed to hire and train the rural population, most of whom were women. Over a million people were benefited in the form of house loans, jobs, better sanitation, health insurance etc. Similarly, Dow and ¡Échale! a tu Casa committed themselves to create sustainable housing solutions for the world's poor.


Citi, in collaboration with the government and businesses of the City of Panama, brought in some unusual solutions to inefficient city planning through “Citi for Cities.” Panama City suffered from congestion and an incompetent public transit system. 862 million dollars were raised by Citi to fund the Panama metro. Throughout this transformation, Citi collaborated with the government to ensure that the local businesses were not dislocated. As a result of this initiative, the average time of Panama residents has reduced by 1 hour 40 minutes, and the transit system could transport 30,000 people per hour.


Pirelli has been working, since 2012, to create sustainable mobility solutions that are accessible universally and lower the negative impact on the environment. Pirelli brought together different companies from the Oil and Gas sector across the world to provide sustainable solutions. To reduce the CO2 emissions and fuel consumption, they created a system that measures the optimal tire temperature and pressure.


Neighbourly matches businesses and communities to create safe, inclusive, and sustainable cities for generations to come. It has connected over 500 M&S stores with NGOs, schools, and food banks to ensure there is no wastage of food. It saved over 240 tons of food from being dumped into a landfill and provided 3.5 lakh meals to local communities.



Analysis and Suggested Path Ahead


According to a recently published report by the National Commission on Population, 40% of India's population will be urban dwellers by 2036. This number is a 57% increment in the size of the urban population. Even over the past few decades, we've seen the urban population in India grow massively. This shoot in urban growth is characterized by rushed and unplanned infrastructure, a lack of services, and a deterioration in new and old residents' standard of living. Additionally, it has also led to a decline in localities of these new developments, often located in the suburbs (and extended suburbs) of urban centers.


Sub Optimal Housing and Overcrowding


Sustainable goals target 11.1 is to ensure that everyone has access to adequate, safe, and affordable housing and essential services. It also recommends the up-gradation of all slums by 2030. According to the 2011 Census, 66 million Indians live in slums. This is 17.4% of the country's urban population. Reducing this number and ensuring that people dwelling in slums have a better standard of living will be the greatest challenge in making our cities sustainable. 


Another important metric to judge the sustainability of poor urban households is accessibility to toilets. About 15% of urban households used shared toilets. The government recognized this concern in power, and heavy investments were made via the Swachh Bharat movement. However, the results proclaimed by the government have been questioned by many. 


Access to Water and Sanitation


Within slums and unplanned urban settlements, access to clean water (both for drinking and other purposes) remains sub-optimal. Around 20% of the households in India have to venture outside their dwelling area to get water. This number increases to about 50% for poorer households. The burden of this mostly falls on women. According to a survey, the adult women in a family are responsible for getting water in 71% of urban households. This acts as a significant barrier in women empowerment as it stops them from pursuing other socio-economic opportunities. 



Access to Green spaces


The UN has described having green spaces as essential to individuals' mental health, well-being, and happiness in cities. The guidelines suggest that cities should have 10-12 meters of open space per person. This would mean that 30-35% of a city's land area should be allocated to green spaces for a typically populated city. 


Indian cities do not meet this requirement. This was a problem highlighted by the pandemic. While residents of other major cities of the world could enjoy the outdoors by spending time (while practicing social distancing) in public spaces and parks, the Indian urban population did not have this luxury. 


Further, access to green spaces also highlights inequality in society. According to an IIT Bombay study, more affluent neighborhoods had better access to green spaces in Mumbai. A large proportion of green spaces are located within gated colonies, access to which is limited for those from vulnerable groups.


Insights


As noted earlier, urbanisation in India is taking place at a pace faster than that of most other countries. It is estimated that every minute witnesses a migration of around 30 rural dwellers to urban cities indicating that cities are no less than growth hubs for India and its overall economic success hinges on their governance and sustainable urbanisation.

In the pursuit of developing the urban sector, the Ministry of Housing Affairs (MoHUA) has launched many schemes, a few of them being the Smart Cities Mission, Swachh Bharat Mission, AMRUT (Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation). While the growing interest in making Indian cities sustainable at the part of the government is a welcome trend, questions have been raised on whether these policy efforts are the best way to go about it or not.


Take for instance the most recent and heavily-funded Smart Cities Mission -- a promise to build 100 “smart” Indian cities by 2023. Experts in the field of urban planning have raised the relevance of smart cities in the existing urban framework where basic services such as - affordable housing, safe public transport, clean water, accessible and affordable electricity, efficient sewage treatment mechanism and green public spaces are already missing on a universal basis. The latest critique has come from the Delhi-based civil society coalition called Housing and Land Rights Network. It claims that although the proposals offered a number of technological solutions for developing urban cities, it has failed to provide a comprehensive vision that accounts for basic services that many urban dwellers and migrants demand. The Mission also fails to take into consideration the basic needs of women, marginalised groups, children, migrants and people with disabilities.


Circulatory Urbanization


Unlike the popular idea of India witnessing a unidirectional movement from rural to urban areas, India is a brand of circulatory urbanisation. It is typical for an urban worker in the country to return to his village twice or thrice a year to help with the farm. This reflects a deferred commuting pattern wherein the village and the city both get classified as active spaces in people’s lives. Hence, the transportation, infrastructure and connectivity facilities are being used both ways, and simply focusing on one side of it would not solve the problem. 



Way Ahead


This in no way suggests that cities have become irrelevant. They, without a doubt, remain key nodes in the ever flourishing domestic as well as global networks. However, what requires attention is the level of connectivity and support that is provided between urban and rural zones. Census data claims that the fastest urbanisation is happening in smaller cities and towns which act as further channels of mobility to large metropolitan centres. Therefore, planners and policy-makers need to recognise the nature of this mobile population and its circulatory nature. For instance, steps towards encouraging affordable rental accommodation in these cities using a more targeted approach can help them reduce slum population.

In conclusion, in the long run, environmental concerns will be best addressed if we aim to balance different modern economic segments -- and then mapping the interconnections and overlaps between them. It is time we stop viewing sustainable urbanisation from the discrete lens of a unit of a city - whether smart or not. A holistic vision which addresses the complications that arise in a circulatory flow model will better help India towards achieving its target of creating sustainable cities and communities. 


References



SIP company sustainability reports

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

SDG 5: Gender Equality

Image
Introduction to SDG 5: Gender Equality One of the most important SDGs today is the Gender Equality goal. First of all, to think that we need a goal for such a fundamental human right such as Gender Equality is in itself a painful thing. The middle-east countries like UAE, Yemen, Lebanon, and Asian countries like Pakistan, Afghanistan and India are amongst the worst-ranked in the world according to a Gender Gap Report published by WEF (World Economic Forum) in 2018 ( (Ahmed, 2019) 1 ) as can be seen in the figure below: There have been some improvements with more number of girls going to school and receiving education as compared to what the situation was 15 years ago ((UNDP, 2019) 2 ). But majority of the women across the globe still face discrimination on multiple fronts. There were only 74 girls enrolled for primary level education for every 100 boys in 2012. There are laws in at least 155 countries which hamper the economic opportunities women can get. And the glo...
Read more

Group 7_A | SDG 12: Responsible Consumption and Production

Image
  Ensuring sustainable consumption and production patterns Authored by:  Aparajita Rai BJ21013 | Deepak Sharma BJ21018 | Jishnu Purkayastha BJ21026 | Nikhil Gupta BJ21033 | Pranav Singla BJ21040 | Utkarsh Mani Tripathi BJ21059 | Zach Tom BJ21061 ( Image Source ) “The world has enough for everyone’s need, but not enough for everyone’s greed.” -    Mahatma Gandhi Introduction to the SDG The world market thrives on production and the demand for consumptions is ever growing. But production of any good requires raw materials and other assets and facilities to process the final product. Generally, such raw materials come from natural resources and require labour. However, with production, waste is also produced. Also, a significant portion of the produced goods goes to waste due to lower consumption or due to the end of their usability cycle. Every year about one-third of all the food produced goes to waste and ends up rotting in bins, landfills, or streets. A similar prob...
Read more

SDG - Combat On Climate Change

Image
Introduction             The United Nations in 2015 adopted 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG's) that it hopes we will achieve by 2030 through the collective action of all countries. The stated goal of SDGs, as envisioned by the UN, is to serve as "the blueprint to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all. SDG 13, in particular, focuses on Climate Action [1] . The global average temperatures in 2017 were 0.9°C higher than the mean of temperatures recorded from 1951 to 1980. The Sea level has been rising at roughly twice the pace of the long-term average. Both of these trends are worrying. As temperatures grow, the agricultural yields suffer, rainfall becomes less predictable, storms become more severe, and freshwater sources become stressed. All of this means that the prices of food will go up. This will affect all of us, but the poor will suffer the most. The same is the case with rising sea levels. Prese...
Read more