at the launch of the MENA Urbanization Knowledge Platform

MENA mayors air strikingly similar concerns

Background More than forty participants including city mayors, members of city councils, urban practitioners and researchers gathered at the Center for Mediterranean Integration in Marseille for the launch of the Middle and North Africa Urbanization Knowledge Platform last September. The design of exchange forum was conceived in close collaboration with MENA cities and for them, through a thorough consultative process including the World Bank and the Arab Urban Development Institute (AUDI), the main partner for the organization of this flagship event. Design and thematic areas The choice of the thematic discussions for the two-day exchange emerged out of consultations with AUDI and effectively allowed the team to focus the content of sessions on three cross-cutting topics: (i) Empowering Local Governments Local Governance -Administratively and Technically, (ii) Empowering Local Governments Financially, and (iii) Strengthening Cities for economic growth and Service Provision. In doing so, the World Bank sought to be in a listening mode as echoed by the design and content of the forum. City mayors intervened as main speakers articulating the priorities for their cities and the policy challenges in addressing them, while urban practitioners and academics commented on and discussed that input in the three thematic panel discussions of the workshop. Such a setup effectively brought best practices and knowledge from the rest of the world to bear on the specific experiences of MENA cities. The lively Q&A sessions following each panel discussion pushed all participants to creatively compare experiences across MENA cities, but also contrast those with the international case studies presented. Policy challenges Three policy concerns rank high on MENA city mayors policy agendas: (i) solid waste management, (ii) public transportation, and (iii) sustainable urban expansion. Because it is harder to conceal cities with degraded public hygiene, solid waste management was the first policy challenge to be raised by the Mayor of Rabat a city of 500,000 inhabitants and an agglomeration of more than 1.8 million dwellers. In the case of Rabat, inter-municipal coordination for solid waste management at the agglomeration level seemed an unavoidable substitute for the private firm which pulled out the sector after the financial crisis. The Mayor of Sfax critiqued the Tunisian states decision to re-centralize solid waste management at the level of the regions instead of collaborating with municipalities and building their capacities to assume this function at the local level. These examples challenged urban practitioners to rethink the advantages and limitations of Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) and the hurdles to adopting decentralized governance for a sector such as solid waste management.

Although Cairo is not among the cities ranked in IBMs annual global Commuter Pain Survey1, its traffic congestion and the adequacy of its public transportation system were lamented. In both Cairo, Rabat and many other MENA cities, planning for efficient and effective public transportation is a challenge. Throughout the region, this activity is still perceived as one with low and at times negative- profit margins, and has thus failed to attract the private sector. In addition, participants underscored the limitations cities face in planning for shared transportation when accounting for the distortive effects of national policies in the sector; for example by subsidizing fuel prices, national governments inadvertently encourage individual car use driving the behavior of the city dwellers away from the use of collective means of transportation. The sustainable management of urban expansion was the most challenging policy issue brought forward. In many ways, managing solid waste and planning for efficient public transportation are only two of the innumerable facets city leaders are confronted with when strategizing for sustainable urban expansion. Land management is at the heart of this daunting policy challenge whether in Casablanca, Rabat, Cairo, Tunis, Sfax or Tripoli (Lebanon).Opening up adequately located land for urban development while outpacing or at least moving in tandem with- informal urban expansion has always proved challenging no matter how sophisticated the planning tools used to address it. Often, the reality outpaces all levels of strategic plans, master plans, and detailed plans which are seldom put to use. The result is that national governments struggle to fund increasingly costly upgrading schemes such as Moroccos Villes Sans Bidonvilles or Tunisias Projet National de la Rehabilitation des Quartiers Populaires (PNRQP); with little room to maneuver cities end up taking on the burden of maintain and operating extended infrastructure, and where government policies fall short of any intervention such as in Tripoli (Lebanon) cities suffer the consequences of enclaved urbanism and poverty. The consequence is, as articulated by MENA city mayors, urbanization showing shortfalls instead of generating wealth. Collective thinking about policy solutions Panelists illustrating best practices to address these issues acknowledged the time dimension of policy change, the importance of integrated planning, and mostly the ability to adapt global solutions to local contexts. Success examples from cities as diverse as Barcelona, Bogota, and Singapore confirmed that three dimensions are at the core of any policy aimed to address these challenges: (i) First, city leadership and adequate skills for city council are essential to bring the city back in. The agency of cities, their ability to overcome fragmented mandates across governance levels, and plan for the integrated development of their jurisdictions instead of being subjected to and at times suffering from- decisions and policies taken at the national level can only be achieved with strong city leadership and only when the latter is coupled with a minimum level of decentralized governance. Capable city leaders, managers and council are essential if we are to move closer to a model where cities are agents of their own development path.

IBM Global Commuter Pain Survey: Traffic Congestion Down, Pain Way Up

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(iii)

Second, the ability to mobilize the financial resources needed to maintain the minimum standards of livable cities and invest in local development is key. An optimum combination of own revenues, central transfers but also strategic leveraging of private sector finance should be considered instead of thinking about these financing sources separately. Third and most importantly security and social stability, especially in a region going through historic changes, and where national belongings, identities, and political allegiances are all up for negotiation.

In probing these three dimensions, mayors acknowledged that all the MENA regions cities are not on equal footing in terms of advancing the dialogue about these core concerns. However, experience exchange, collective thinking and brainstorming about policy options are invaluable to push the city forward in these debates, and heighten its role at the national level. In that perspective, participants stressed the importance of the Banks role as a powerful convener and a repository of knowledge and experiences. As such, at the request of the mayors, the design of a MENA-specific Urbanization Knowledge Platform is currently underway. The platform is being conceived as a virtual meeting space where mayors, urban practitioners and researchers from the region can engage in discussions, share knowledge, data and information, and tap into the World Banks wealth of knowledge in the sector. This launch event will be followed by a thematic workshop planned to be held in February 2013.