UN-Habitat: Urban governance systems failing to meet modern challenges

Existing urban governance systems are inadequate to cope with the complexity of today's urban development challenges, Rafael Tuts, Director of UN-Habitat's Global Solutions Division, said at the Global Launch of the Master in City Administration (MCA) Program at WUF13 in Baku, Report informs.

He noted that UN-Habitat, working in more than 90 countries, often sees ambitious urban development policies that stall at the implementation stage.

"We often lack the ability to integrate finance, management, planning, and policy into coherent, fundable, and implementable solutions," he noted, emphasizing that the problem lies not in a lack of vision, but in the inability of leaders and governments to translate knowledge into coordinated, sustainable action on the ground.

Tuts presented the MCA program in Baku as one of the tools for training a new generation of urban leaders.

"We highly value her multidisciplinary design, which integrates city finance, housing systems, infrastructure, governance and political leadership," he said.