The Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management (CIWEM) supports the UN’s World Habitat Day 2009, which is raising awareness of the need to improve urban planning to deal with the major challenges of the twenty first century.
In both developed and developing countries, cities and towns are increasingly feeling the effects of climate change, resource depletion, food insecurity, unsustainable population growth and economic instability. Half of humanity is now living in towns and cities, resulting in over crowding, increased crime rates and rising pollution levels. Unfortunately, many current urban planning systems are ill equipped to deal with these major urban challenges or have contributed to the problems of marginalisation and exclusion in rapidly growing, poor and informal cities.
The CIWEM believes that we should examine the way we live and address the growth in our population levels. More people living high-consumption lifestyles means faster climate change and an uncertain future for all.
Many nations aspire to higher living standards, more economic growth and more consumption. But real wealth is expressed in close communities, human relationships, landscapes of small settlements and healthy lifestyles. Consumer-led societies can result in alienation, greed and dispossession, and consequences of large populations are high unemployment, poverty and crimes. CIWEM believes that a better managed population could empower working people, raise the status of the socially excluded, reduce inequalities, eradicate poverty and increase access to clean water and sanitation.
Nick Reeves, Executive Director of CIWEM, says: “How bad does it have to get before we properly plan for a future in a world bent out of shape by climate change? It is self-evident that population x consumption = impact. Unless something is done, our quality of life, except for a minority of the rich and powerful, will decline. We know the problems, but we need to share the best solutions as efficiently and widely as possible by planning better and more sensitively for ourselves and our environment. With over half of the world’s population currently living in urban areas, and this number set to rise to two-thirds in another generation, there is no doubt that the urban agenda need to become a priority for governments everywhere.”
The Chartered Institution of Water and Environmental Management, CIWEM, is an independent professional body and a registered charity, advancing the science and practice of water and environmental management for a clean, green and sustainable world. www.ciwem.org
See CIWEM’s Policy Position Statement on Living Within Environmental Limits on www.ciwem.org/policy/policies/environmental_limits.asp
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