Conference on sustainable development in the city: "Nachhaltige Entwicklung findet STADT" - Leaving no one behind

Following a two-year break due to COVID-19, the City of Vienna's development policy expert meeting (Entwicklungspolitische Fachtagung der Stadt Wien) was held on 21 October 2022.

Hannes Lagrelius, Bernhard Bouzek, Natalie Plhak, Municipal Councillor Peter Florianschütz, Ian Banerjee, Olivia Tischler and Julian Baskin (f.l.t.r.)

In cooperation with the agency "Südwind", Municipal Department 27 - European Affairs (MA 27) organised an international conference on sustainable development in Vienna. Under the heading of "Nachhaltige Entwicklung findet STADT", five international experts were invited to Vienna City Hall to discuss the latest urbanisation trends in the Global South.

• Ian Banerjee, urban researcher at the Vienna University of Technology. Having focused on examples of urban planning success for 20 years now, he dealt with the transformative power of digital platforms. The expert highlighted that many projects promoting innovative participation of previously marginalised people and people living in poverty have been developed and implemented over the past eight years. As 80 per cent of the world's urban development is currently taking place in the informal sector, it is thus necessary to focus on alternative methods that enable people to participate in the economy. In India, for instance, the informal sector makes up a share of 85 per cent of the economy. In 2014, half of all Indians did not have a bank account and were thus excluded from formal transfers and larger financial transactions. Following the introduction of the new payment system "Unified Payment Interface", however, 80 percent of the Indian population are now able to perform financial transactions using their mobile phones, and a total of 6.7 billion transactions annually, involving a volume of 140 billion US dollars, have already been conducted using this tool.
• Hannes Lagrelius, who works for the World Blind Union (WBU) in Nairobi, held a presentation on the organisation's activities. The WBU is the global advocacy group for blind and visually impaired people and enjoys consultative status with UN agencies. The need for inclusive, accessible and barrier-free infrastructure and services will continue to increase with more than two billion people with disabilities expected to be living in urban areas in 2050. In his contribution, Lagrelius placed a special focus on continuous and equitable cooperation with people with impairments.
• Karin Küblböck, economist and senior researcher at the Austrian Foundation for Development Research (ÖFSE), presented specific approaches towards participatory urban development processes taken by two cities in India and Jordan. She highlighted the importance of further promoting the dialogue between science and civil society to enable making demands on politics that are both expedient and robust.
• Julian Baskin, Principal Urban Adviser at Cities Alliance, a global partnership fighting urban poverty and supporting cities to deliver sustainable development, focused in his presentation on towns and cities in Africa. The continent has reached almost the same level of urbanisation as China, and has as many cities in excess of 1 million inhabitants as Europe. The senior urban specialist emphasised the importance of ensuring that sustainable urban development also went hand in hand with the creation of decent work.
• Sarah Habersack joined the conference live from Brazil, where she heads the strategic area of "Urban Change" for Germany's main development agency, the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ). Based on the examples presented, she made it clear that approaches to dealing with urban problems are to be found within cities themselves and that these approaches are increasingly building on nature-based solutions. Habersack highlighted that it was essential for city administrations to adopt an open and participatory approach and that the public sector acts as manager and mediator of digital transformation in cities.

Although all five experts addressed the topic of "Sustainable Cities - Leaving no one behind" from their respective perspectives, their level of consensus on participation being an essential factor for sustainable transformation in cities was remarkable. Accordingly, it is necessary to create spaces for the most diverse groups to discuss and share ideas, enabling them to assume responsibility and join forces in jointly developing novel solutions.