Shri Venkaiah Naidu, Minister
of Urban Development and Housing & Urban Poverty Alleviation made a
commitment to support APMCHUD during the Plenary of APMCHUD Conference at
Seoul. He indicated that India is committed to provide
its full support to the APMCHUD’s initiatives and India
agrees with the decision of APMCHUD that strengthening the Secretariat to
undertake multifarious activities is an urgent necessity, and is in the
interest of the APMCHUD movement. He further declared that as
resolved during the 4th Amman Conference, India would contribute to
strengthening the Secretariat of APMCHUD by providing the agreed support of US$
10,000 annually. In addition, India is also considering to provide an initial
one time contribution, to enable the Secretariat function in a full-fledged
manner.
The
5th Asia Pacific Ministerial Conference on Housing and Urban
Development is being held at Seoul during 3 to 5 November, 2014. The
Conference is being attended by Ministers of Housing & Urban Development
from 19 countries which includesSouth Korea, Japan, Iran, Iraq, Saudi Arabia,
Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Nepal, Maldives, Bangladesh, Afghanistan and India among
others in addition to delegations from other countries totalling to
participation from 32 countries.
The delegation from India includes Ms. Anita
Agnihotri, Secretary HUPA, Shri Sanjeev Kumar, Joint Secretary, HUPA and Shri
M. Ravi Kanth, CMD, HUDCO.
In
his address to the Ministerial Conference Shri Venkaiah Naidu indicated that the
countries in the Asia-Pacific region have exhibited moderate to significant
level of economic growth in the recent past, and the region has presented
itself as an Economic Power-house. The pro-active policies of the Governments,
the willingness of the entire population and particularly the youth to put-in
hard efforts, the high level of technical expertise, a significant level of
improvements in the infrastructure and social development status, have all
together resulted in a substantial improvement in economic status with a higher
level of internal and foreign direct investments in many Asia Pacific
countries. In many countries, the major cities play the role of backbone of
their economies. A significant level of the GDP of many countries is
contributed by the urban settlement systems, in Asia Pacific countries.
Shri
Venkaiah Naidu further outlined that the increasing economic dynamism and
growing urbanization levels is also associated with increasing levels of
unacceptable human conditions in the cities in many countries. Proliferation
of slums and informal settlements, increasing traffic congestion on city roads,
higher densities and dilapidated conditions in city centre, significant decline
in overall hygienic conditions are some of the manifestations of the inability
of the urban settlements to keep pace with the emerging situation. About 60%
of the entire human population has been estimated to be residing in the
Asia-Pacific countries, and by 2030, the region would accommodate more than
half of the world’s urban population. The region is also assessed to
accommodate about 60% of the world’s poor people, and about 40 to 50 percent of
the urban population in the region is assessed to be living in slums, slum like
conditions and informal settlements.
In
this context, the Minister urged that it has increasingly become necessary to
relook into the urban planning practices, to make them inclusive in approach,
pragmatic in orientation and futuristic in vision.
During
the Conference, India which currently is the lead country for the working group
of APMCHUD on Urban and Rural Planning and Management highlighted various
initiatives taken by India. In this regard, the recommendations of the
International Conference organised by India on the theme of Urban and Rural
Planning and Management was presented before the plenary of APMCHUD on 3rd
November, 2014 at Seoul. The major recommendations were as under:
I.
Approaches
to Urban and Rural Planning and Management in Asia Pacific Region.
1)
The urban
centres in the countries of Asia-Pacific region are playing the role of
generators of economic growth momentum and act as the backbone of the economy
of their respective countries.
2)
In the
context of the rapid urbanization, need to place human settlements planning
appropriately in the realm of development planning.
3)
The
planning process need to be reoriented towards being `bottom’ driven and
participatory, rather than `top’ driven and expert oriented.
4)
The role
of the Governments in most of the countries appears to be changing from actual
`delivery’ to being `facilitators’. While this approach may be appropriate,
the Governments will have much increased role in the era of
privatization/globalisation by way of regulating and addressing the
requirements of the urban poor.
5)
There is
also a need to enlarge the platform from Public Private Partnership (PPP) to
Public Private People Partnership (PPPP). The essential role of the
Governments should be to achieve a balance between social costs and private
benefits, and social benefits and private costs.
6)
In the emerging
context, the Metros and Mega Cities will need to focus on efforts to reduce the
consumption of land, water and energy.
7)
Metro and
Mega Cities shall also be required to reorient or evolve an urban form capable
to incorporate renewed planning so as to make way for ever changing technology,
transport and business.
8)
Integration
of land use and public transport should be a focus area and cities need to be
restructured in accordance with the same.
9)
Each country would review the
efficiency, applicability of the same especially in view of operationalisation
and implementation of the plans, environmental issues, hazard prone areas as
well as issues connected with urban poor.
10)
Small and
Island Nations need to focus their planning efforts, inter-alia, in relation to
the environmental sensitivity issues including impact of climate change, and
the planning paradigm needs to shift to focus additional and centre-stage such
critical issues of long term in nature.
11)
Disaster
preparedness should be a focus area of human settlement planning. Every
planning effort should essentially incorporate, in relation to the anticipated
natural calamities, the context based response mechanism and avenues.
II
: Inclusive Planning and Practices
1)
The Human
Settlements planning should be `people centric’ rather than ‘project and space
centric’.
2)
The
planning process should be `inclusive’ by adequately recognizing the role of
`informal sector and settlements’ and should follow a `city-wide approach’.
3)
The human
settlements planning should be sensitive to the requirements of all the
sections of the society and particularly the women, children,
differently-abled, and such other socially disadvantaged, and the planning
efforts and outputs should be responsive and incorporate provisions that
address such special requirements.
4)
The human
settlements planning process should be `pro-active’ in anticipating the growth
dynamics and its expected impact on city structure and form, and accordingly
incorporate futuristic provisions for urban poor and vulnerable sections.
5)
Need to evolve a range of options
for shelter delivery, in tune with the affordability of the anticipated
sections of the society. Feasibility of incorporating provisions such as
reservation of land and housing in major development projects for the urban
poor need a special focus.
6)
Access to
basic services to all sections of the city should be the core objective of all
planned efforts, with focus on sanitation, health and education services.
7)
The
planning process must recognize the locational association in terms of
work-residence relationship, and accordingly, accommodate the same while
considering any urban renewal effort.
8)
The
planning process should recognize the contributory role of the urban poor, in
the city’s function and economy, and need to incorporate provisions that would
facilitate their integration in the urban society.
9)
The local
culture need to be used as a tool for harnessing support and cooperation of the
local community.
10) The planning efforts must ensure the preservation
of culturally rich cities and the cultural identify of cities, and focus on
preservation and conservation of the cultural heritage of such cities and their
value enhancement.
III. Urban-Rural
Continuum - Imperatives of Integrated Planned Development
1)
The
planning process must recognize that human settlements are like organisms and
they tend to grow within a socio-economic and cultural milieu. Thus, the
existing complementary relationship in the resource flow and interaction
between the urban and the rural hinterland should form the basis for integrated
planning.
2)
Asia
Pacific countries need to incorporate a regional settlement development
framework in their human settlements planning effort.
3)
The
planning of large cities should essentially be on a larger regional canvas to
facilitate development in a regional resource framework.
4)
In the
context of rapid urbanization, it is imperative that if the planning process is
not responsive, the peri-urban areas would face haphazard development.
5)
There is
an increasing tendency for large scale space intensive and also polluting
activities getting located in the urban fringe areas in most cities of the
countries. The planning process must be
sensitive towards this issue to ensure that the fragile fringe areas do not
become dumping yards for the large cities.
6)
The
planning efforts need to ensure strengthening the connectivity of the mother
city and its region, towards facilitating spatial disbursal of unmanageable
growth from the city, and also facilitating the ‘deprived’ periphery to attract
activities.
IV:
Land-related issues in Urban and Rural Planning and Management
1)
A more
democratic approach towards land acquisition and development to minimize the
need for conversion of agricultural land for urbanization and controlling the
urban sprawl by optimum densities, intensive development and decentralization.
2)
Toward the
same, an inclusive land policy and participatory planning effort, where in-situ
rehabilitation can be done by using land as a resource needs to form part of
City Planning process.
3)
In the
context of land become a scarce commodity in cities for organized development,
innovative land pooling, readjustment and development models, deserves
examination for suitable adoption and adaption.
4)
A hybrid
Land Policy to suit various types of development may be adopted by synergizing
the resources of both public and private sectors. Such a land policy may have a
combination of modes such as compulsory land acquisition through
cash/alternative land allotment, development rights, FAR/FSI and Land Pooling.
The infrastructure development can be financed through various monetization
modes such as conversion charges, FAR charges, Betterment Levy, etc.
5)
Public
Private Partnership in Land development initiatives covering land acquisition,
development and disposal, may be encouraged and prerequisites for implementing
Public-Private-Participation in Land Policy should be in place before hand.
Simplification of all regulations and procedures concerning land management,
guaranteeing more transparency and cheaper land administration, better
information base, like MIS enabled GIS, computerization of land records and
inventory of land need to be done.
6)
A strong
legal and regulatory framework would be necessary for enhancing the
participation of the private sector in development of land. Innovations like
land sharing, one-window approval, permitting Transferable Development Rights,
fiscal incentives for private sector development, etc. would go a long way in
making PPP in land development a success.
7)
Incorporation
of `Informal Sector’ in planned development by earmarking `hawking Zones’,sites
for `weekly markets’, new areas for informal trades and involvement of NGOs,
etc. is very relevant for most Asia Pacific countries and require attention.
8)
In the
context of rapid growth of cities, the urban land need to be appropriately
organized and utilized towards adequately meeting the financial requirements
for implementation of the city plan.
V. Tools,
Technologies and Capacity Building for Urban and Rural Planning and Management
1)
By using
Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) in convergence with Geographic Information
System (GIS) techniques accurate information on environment and infrastructure
resources could be collected and maintained in data bank at
country/state/district/block/ward/slum level.
2)
The
successful use of Spatial Data Infrastructure (SDI) in governance and
development will depend upon pervasiveness of the basic Information
Communication Technology (ICT) infrastructure. SDI and GIS techniques should be
effectively utilized in preparedness of disaster management programme.
3)
It is necessary to strengthen
the planning education structure and network in all the countries, to have
adequate and trained personnel in the field of sustainable development of human
settlements at large.
4)
Planning
is a process, and there is a need to ensure a continuing effort for capacity
building of the personnel involved.
5)
For
capacity building of urban managers, Exchange Programmes for city mayors/officials
of ULBs need to be introduced between countries of Asia-Pacific region.
6)
Institutions
imparting training in innovative planning techniques need to be identified in
countries of the Asia- Pacific region.
7)
For
exchange of technical know-how of tools and technologies in planning and
management, an Asia Pacific Alliance for urban and rural managers could be
constituted.
8)
An award
for `the most liveable and inclusive city’ could be introduced/initiated with
seed money being provided by member countries.
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AKS