UCLG Africa presents the African Cities Development Fund (ACDF) at the Workshop on Integrated Urban Development of the Global Platform for Sustainable Cities

Sustainable and inclusive urban development is the vision that guides the Global Platform for Sustainable Cities (GSPC).  As part of the implementation of this vision, GSPC organized, in partnership with the World Bank and the African Development Bank, a workshop on Integrated Urban Development, from May14-16, 2018, in Dakar, Senegal.

Approximately one hundred people took part in the workshop, including representatives from the United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO), the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the World Bank, the African Development Bank (Afdb), and 10 African countries.

The Global Platform for Sustainable Cities brings together all participating cities and a wide range of entities that are working on issues for urban sustainability to create a shared platform for global knowledge and an evidence-based, integrated approach to realize its outcomes.

Funded by the Global Environment Facility (GEF), the platform currently comprises of 28 cities in 11 countries, including a dozen African cities, (Accra, Johannesburg, Abidjan, Dakar, Djamnagio, Saint-Louis, Douala, Nairobi, Yaoundé and Dodoma). The purpose of the Dakar workshop was to promote integrated approaches to urban development, capacity-building and an exchange of experiences.

Issues addressed included urban data, the implementation of integrated planning, urban mobility in Africa, the “Transport oriented Development” (TOD) approach , financial municipal viability and public-private partnership.

In the financial dimension section, a presentation of the African Cities Development Fund (ACDF) was made by the Director of Programs for UCLG Africa, Dr. François Yatta.  The African Cities Development Fund is designed as a cooperative fund of the major African cities, (about 20 cities at first), that will undertake to disburse a seed capital of 100,000 Euros.

This seed capital should be used to raise additional resources from the financial institutions or the financial markets. The fund is intended to finance the investments and services needed to cope with the rapid growth of the continent’s cities making the current operation of most African cities globally ineffective. Access requirements should also help to improve the financial performance and governance of local and regional governments and promote more cost-effective and efficient investment choices economically and socially. The call for expressions of interest for the ACDF  was shared with cities present at the workshop.

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In addition, the meeting allowed participants to learn from the application of the  “Urban Sustainable Framework”  or Urban sustainability Framework approach. This approach is structured in two parts

The first is to understand and achieve urban sustainability through a four-step approach that includes:

– The diagnosis of the current situation of the city.

– The definition of a vision for change and priority setting;

– A financing approach in the plan that demonstrates fiscal viability;

– Monitoring and evaluation.

The second part concerns the GPSC’s measurement framework, which builds a common understanding of sustainability in the urban context through two dimensions.

The Enabling Dimension:

– Governance and integrated urban planning

– Fiscal viability

The dimensions of the results:

– Urban economies.

– Environment and natural resources;

– Climate action and resilience;

– Inclusiveness and quality of life.

The exchanges helped to explore good practices and positive results achieved in the cities.