A vez dos Alagados: A construção de um programa integrado de urbanização de favela em Salvador

This publication captures the lessons learned from the well-known slum upgrading project in the State of Bahia, Brazil, which was implemented from 2001 to 2006. The Bahia slum upgrading project was one of the first activities undertaken by the Cities Alliance, following its formation in 1999. It mobilised a broad coalition of partners to work in Alagados, a well-known slum in the Brazilian city of Salvador: namely, the government of the State of Bahia, the World Bank, the Government of Italy, AVSI (an international development NGO) and more then 70 local community based associations. It introduced a then innovative participatory and integrated approach to project implementation, which led to great success and positively impacted the lives of the slum dwellers. Success of the programme in Alagados led to the scaling up of the slum upgrading activity throughout the state of Bahia and indirectly contributed to the Brazilian government’s national slum upgrading programme known as PAC.

This publication is currently available only in the Portuguese language, but an English version will soon be published. To download the Portuguese version click here:
http://www.citiesalliance.org/doc/resources/upgrading/alagados/alagados-full.pdf

Approaches to Urban Slums: A Multimedia Sourcebook on Adaptive and Proactive Strategies. Edited by Barjor Mehta and Arish Dastur

This multimedia sourcebook on CD-ROM synthesises an extensive body of knowledge and experience in managing urban slums accumulated over the last 30 years. The key lessons learned and their implications for future work serve as a useful tool for capacity building and knowledge sharing for policy makers, practitioners, planning institutions, community groups, NGOs, and university students. Approaches to Urban Slums include 14 audiovisual presentations (photographs, illustrations, maps, graphic animations, and aerial imagery, along with voice-over narration) and 18 video interviews, including interviews of government representatives, NGOs, Communities and the private sector, and of the UN Millennium Task Force on Improving the Lives of Slum Dwellers. The Sourcebook was prepared by the World Bank Institute of the World Bank, with support from the Cities Alliance and UN-HABITAT. To order please click on this link:

http://publications.worldbank.org/ecommerce/catalog/product?item_id=7972209.

UNEP and UN-HABITAT Launch Publications extending “Local Action for Biodiversity”

UN-HABITAT and UNEP, in collaboration with the Local Governments for Sustainability (ICLEI) recently launched two publications - “Promoting Biodiversity in and around the Lake Victoria Basin,” and “Local Action for Biodiversity, a Series of Local Cases”. Case studies from around the world in both books show how cities are cooperating with national governments and other key partners to utilise and conserve their surroundings.

The venue of launch was the Mayors’ Conference at the 9th Conference of the Parties of the UN Convention on Biological Diversity in Bonn Germany on 28 May 2008

Although they occupy only 2 percent of the total land surface of Earth, cities use 75 percent of the planet’s natural resources. This fact, combined with increasing levels of urbanisation and subsequent heavy reliance on ecosystem services has resulted in a multitude of threats to the urban environment: habitat loss, degradation and fragmentation, over-exploitation of natural resources, invasion of alien species, pollution and climate change.

Conversely, in the words of Achim Steiner, UNEP’s Executive Director, “there are many shining examples of intelligent management of the planet's nature-based resources. The time has come to accelerate and replicate them across the globe backed by sufficient finance, creative market mechanisms, and strengthening of efforts to achieve the three objectives of the Convention on Biological Diversity, including access to genetic resources and benefit sharing, and a new sense of urgency.”

Managing Asian Cities, Asian Development Bank (ADB), 2008

The challenge of urbanisation in Asia is unprecedented — some 1.1 billion people will move to cities in the next 20 years. Managing Asian Cities aims to provide a useful management resource, canvassing key issues and pointing managers to appropriate responses to problems; and, provide the initial step in a new phase of ADB's continuing support to Asian cities under its Strategy 2020. The study is organised in two parts. The first reviews the existing situation. The second presents options for improved urban management practice.

The report provides options for solving problems. Differentiating between cities in terms of wealth, size, and capacity it also focuses on a city’s self-reliance, suggesting ways in which different types of cities can take on more responsibility for their own development, especially in terms of creating enabling frameworks for urban development. Government is seen as more of a facilitator for the community and private sector than as an implementer.

For further details click here: http://www.adb.org/Documents/Studies/Managing-Asian-Cities/default.asp