Urbanization and sustainability in south Asia:
The evidence on the population growth of urban centers also suggests that medium sized cities in the order of 500,000 to 2 million will experience the highest urbanization rates. The population and housing densities in south Asian countries are continuing to decline, and the increase in the urban population will mean a much greater demand for the urban land in these cities in future. With the exception of Singapore no country in south Asia has solved its housing problems.
While there is much debate, there is real doubt whether the earth’s ecological systems can accommodate the developing world’s drive toward developed countries’ production and consumptions using existing resource-intensive technologies. The most challenging problem facing Asian cities is meeting the demand for and maintaining urban infrastructure to provide access to good quality, affordable and reliable services.
Asia suffers from enormous disparity in income levels, living standards and socio-economic conditions, while poverty will tend to remain worse in rural areas. Urban poverty is a crucial issue characterized by employment, lack of skills and unequal access to infrastructure services. The central problem of urban finance in South Asian countries is the weakness of the revenue base of local governments. Successful urban development requires developing partnerships among all parties involved.
v Urbanization in Pakistan:
Under funding of municipal governments by the Pakistan government and poor attention to revenue collection over the decades have weakened the capacity of municipal governments to fund, build and maintain infrastructure. Water and sanitation are affected particularly.
Ø Three case studies
There are three case studies, Lodhran, Faisalabad and Waste Busters.
· Lodhran:
Lodhran is an evolving district in Punjab with poor sanitation facilities. It is based on the well- known Orangi model; a local NGO mobilized the community to self finance construction of in-house latrines and the laying of drains while the local government linked the neighborhood drains with the trunk sewers. Donors helped by investing in developing the organizational and technical capacity of the NGO.
· Faisalabad:
The situation with regard to lack of water was similar in fasalabad and an NGO responded following the same self-help Orangi model. The NGO was able to coax the community and the local government to pay for house connections and water mains connection, respectively involving community labor, at an estimated savings of 60% of a commercial operation.
· Waste Busters:
Waster busters is a private company that started collecting solid waste had become a hazard in Lahore. The company charges the market price for collecting waste. Waste busters sorts and recycles the waste, and sells organic fertilizers. The company is highly awarded and the idea has spread around the country.
These three case studies are examples if a successful community involved in municipal service delivery. They also highlight the strengths of public community partnerships. The important roles played by community leaders and mobilizers in the NGOs were critical in the first two projects, while the entrepreneurial leadership of waste b busters similarly led to a service that municipal authorized failed to provide.
v The urbanization challenges in Pakistan developing vision 2030:
This brief outlines the urban challenges that Pakistan will likely to face in next 25 years. The brief also offers strategies to address those challenges in urban Pakistan. Over the next 25 years, the urban population in Pakistan is likely to increase by 140%. This dramatic increase in urban population will add another 80 million to the urban population in Pakistan, bringing the total urban population to a 130 million people. The year 2030 will also be a major landmark in Pakistan’s development as a nation. For the first time in 83 years, the urban population in Pakistan will constitute 50% of the total population. From nearly 50 million urbanites today Pakistan will be home to a massive urban population if 130 million, with one of the largest urban centers in the world. The urbanization in Pakistan is likely to pose new challenges in governance and urban service delivery. The current appalling state of most urban centers may worsen with time if the developed challenges were not recognized and dealt with in a planned and systematic manner. While urbanization poses new challenges, it will also create new opportunities for growth and prosperity.
A natural by-product of urbanization will be the emergence of a middle class of over a 100 million individuals, who will not only c create a domestic market for goods and services, but at the same time can create a skilled workforce that can become the engine of growth and source of innovation. The vision of 2030 for urban Pakistan should aim for creating healthy, prosperous, socially, just and environmentally sustainable urban communities, which would continue to the growth and prosperity of the entire nation. The vision 2030 for Pakistan should recognize that the cities would be the primary engines of growth, development and innovation in Pakistan. Vision 2030 should aim for creating urban centers in Pakistan that could compete globally in the future with other knowledge economies.
v Urban challenges:
It is no longer possible to over look the urban decay in Pakistan. Streets are littered with waste, drains are overflowing with sewage. Low lying communities are inundated after rainfall, traffic congestion is ubiquitous and the violent crime in urban centers in on the rise. The state either has divested from or is no longer able to offer reliable mass transit, good quality and affordable primary education and health care. This has given the opportunity to the private sector to take up some of these roles. However, the private sector has assumed these roles at the cost of social justice and equity. Affordable public healthcare, public transit, security and primary/secondary education are some of the sectors where the private sector has filled the void left by the public sector. However, these services are very expensive and only a small segment could afford them. In brief the urban rot in Pakistan is screaming at us, pleading for intervention.
v Infrastructure deficit:
The infrastructure deficit is the most obvious telltale of urban decay in Pakistan. Some indications would help understand the scope of the problem. Less than 1% of waste water is treated in Pakistan. The rest is dumped into ravines, streams and rivers. The result has been drastic brooks. Streams, ravines and rivers have turned into sewers. The metropolitan governments recover fewer than 50% of the solid waste generated in the cities. The rest is left on the streets. Even the waste that is collected is mostly dumped in open fields or is incinerated. The dumped waste pollutes the ground water and the incinerated waste creates air pollution. Lahore, a sprawling metropolis of seven million has fewer than 100 traffic lights which are insufficient measures of traffic management. The result is severe traffic congestion. In the federal capital Islamabad even the well off communities face chronic water shortages.
v Urban poverty and unemployment:
The infrastructure deficit and the associated urban decay are only one manifestation of much more complex structural dynamics and constraints. The poor economic growth specifically the low rate of employment growth for the youth, lack of entrepreneurship and the collapse of civilian institutions are some of the more inherent causes of the urban decay in Pakistan. Consider that the largest and the fastest growing cohort I Pakistan between the ages of 15 and 25 years. In urban areas, more often than not, the youth are educated. However, gainful employment even for the educated youth remains elusive. Add to this the lack of entrepreneurship, and the result is any army of unemployed youth, who are readily drafted by the mafia or other degenerated groups. This may be the reason behind the increase in violent crime in the last decade in Pakistan. Media reports suggested that the first week of January 2006 witnessed 10 murders in Karachi and seven in Lahore. With the coming of age of large number of unemployed, educated youth in urban Pakistan, the severity of challenges in only likely to increase.
v Incoherent future ambitions for urban Pakistan:
Another challenge in urban Pakistan is the intolerance towards the diversity of views and virtues for the future of urban Pakistan. On one hand are the conservatives who would like to see the economic growth of cities divorced from the cultural evolution and diversity. On the other hand are the pragmatists who see cultural evolution a natural outcome of the urbanization process. Consider the riots took place in Lahore in 2005 on the issue of holding a marathon. The lack of tolerance towards divergent views continues to pull urban Pakistan in different directions, which is not conducive for growth and development.
v Devolution plan:
Recent innovation in governance is likely to affect the future of cities in Pakistan. Under the devolution plan, a new system of municipal governance has been laid out in Pakistan. The salient features include emancipation of women (more than 25% of the 130,000 off municipal representatives are women) devolution of power for local decision making process. These developments are monumental from Pakistan’s perspective. These changes accompanied with the much needed, municipal financial reform, which is yet to occur are likely to bring positive change in Pakistan.
v Urban sector policies:
The following section outlines the generic policies that need to be formulated and implemented in Pakistan. While some of these policies may exist, however their implementation has remained a challenge.
v Local economic policy making:
Urban economic development and job creation is not a well defined mandate of the urban and regional governments in Pakistan. Large metropolitan areas such as Lahore, Karachi and Faisalabad should have offices for economic development and poverty alleviation. The federal government indeed enjoys the mandate at the national level; however the local level economic policies will be able to capitalize on the competitive advantage or urban centers nationally and internationally. Given that cities have already started to compete directly in the gloablized economy, the need for urban economic development policies, which are inherently location-specific, will be felt even more in the future.
v Housing and land policy:
There is an estimated backlog of six million housing units in Pakistan. Inadequate housing over crowding, poor indoor air quality, and lack of affordable land and hoc treatment of informal settlements within urban areas are some of the challenges facing urban Pakistan today. The urban development authorities have systematically shifted public land to a privileged few by sanctioning public land to land development schemes initiated by the military and other privileged groups in the civilian setup. Land had thus become the primary instrument of wealth creation in Pakistan. This process has created severe inequalities in urban centers. Low income communities have been shunned to largely undesirable part of the cities. A new housing and land policy is needed for urban centers in Pakistan. The primary goal for this policy should be to address the systematic bias towards the low income households who have suffered at the hands of the urban development schemes. The new housing and land policy should recognize the right to shelter for all and not just a privileged few. A housing policy that gives equal treatment to the housing development plans put forth by the community-based organizations is the need of the hour in urban Pakistan.
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