MALAYSIA SUSTAINABLE URBANISATION

The world is experiencing an unprecedented transition from predominantly rural to mainly urban living, with more than 55 percent of the world’s population already living in urban areas and this figure is set to rise to 70 percent by the middle of 21st century. 

Cities will be key to achieving the global Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDGs come into effect in a world that is increasingly urban, with a little over half the global population Urbanization has thrown up some of the world’s greatest development challenges, but it also has tremendous opportunities for advancing sustainable development. Cities are synonyms of progress and growth, but some have become niches of poverty and inequality presenting city authorities with complex challenges. 

Cities are constantly evolving and are transitioning faster than at any point in history and managing this change is becoming a difficult proposition. City authorities are closest to the citizens and ground level realities and therefore play a key role in providing the impetus for progress. It is fundamental that city authorities are empowered, to enable them to meet their obligations and reach the objectives to realize sustainable urban development. 

The SDGs recognize the importance of urban development in providing a better quality of life to people across the globe. SDG 11 provides guidance to city authorities to renew cities and human settlements that promote community cohesion, employment, sense of security, well- being for all and better environment management. It has close relevance to the New Urban Agenda and presents an opportunity to complement and integrate efforts to make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable. The participation of city authorities is vital in evaluating the results, the outcomes and the implementation of the New Urban Agenda. 

The New Urban Agenda is an ambitious agenda which aims at paving the way towards making cities and human settlements more inclusive and ensuring that everyone can bene t from urbanization. The strategies embodied in the New Urban Agenda comprise national urban policies, rules and regulations, urban planning and design, financing urbanization and of course, their local implementation. These five strategies are the key principles for achieving sustainable development and growth. 

Now is the time for transformational urbanization to be promoted as a centrepiece of development policy at the international, national and local level. Malaysia recognises that a comprehensive implementation of SDGs will require the mobilisation of resources, including manpower, capacity building, and physical spaces as well as funding. 

Since Malaysia’s national development plan has always been geared towards economic, social and environmental agenda, the implementation of SDGs in Malaysia is aligned with the five-year national development plan, which utilises the government development budget. Thus, allocation of resources and funding are readily made available. However, the SDG Decade of Action got off to one of the roughest starts imaginable.

As the COVID-19 pandemic swept across the globe, governments scrambled to redirect resources to the immediate health and socioeconomic crises before them. For many countries, the current national priority is to rebuild their battered economies while fending off potential new waves of infection. 

Localization relates both to how the SDGs can provide a framework for local development policy and to how local and regional governments can support the achievement of the SDGs through action from the bottom up and to how the SDGs can provide a framework for local development policy.