Urban and ecosystem development: seminar at World Water Week 2018!

Urban and ecosystem development: Hand in hand

Co-convenors: Stockholm International Water Institute (SIWI), CAF – development bank of Latin America, Urban Waters Hub (GWP/HABITAT) and SIAAP

Urbanization continues to be a major demographic trend. World’s urban population increased to 54% of the world population in 2014, proportion that is expected to grow to 70% by 2050. These trends pose serious challenges to ecosystem health and human well-being; however, urbanization is not inherently bad for ecosystems if they are well managed in an Integrated Urban Water Management (IUWM) fashion. Traditional approaches have proven insufficient and the development of an urban ecosystem approach in times of uncertainty and increasing vulnerability is crucial. Additionally, aiming for green cities development means working with nature to comprehensively reshape and retrofit urban areas. Thus, it is critical to reframe urban design and management as an urban ecosystem, considering rural-urban-coastal linkages in an overall basin context and a green economy framework. This has the potential to fully harnesses the vital urban contribution to sustainable development, improve well-being, foster resilience, and protect the environment.

The objectives of the seminar are to contribute to the future adoption of an ecosystem approach to improve urban policy development and management, in the context of the New Urban Agenda, green cities concept and the urban and water related SDG targets. The seminar will focus on experiences that reframe urban design and management, taking an urban ecosystems approach, and considering rural-urban-coastal linkages in an overall basin context and a green economy framework. We aim to draw replicability lessons from evidence-based experiences of innovative urban planning retrofitting urban areas to both provide for current and future challenges as well as increased resiliency.

Please read more on how to engage and submit your abstract here.

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