Strengthening communities for the future we want: urban-rural linkages policy, legislation and governance

Population growth in cities and increased urbanization across all countries has brought opportunities for many people, but also has resulted in an increasing demand for resources and additional pressures on land-use change worldwide. Although cities occupy just 3 per cent of the Earth’s surface, they are responsible for the consumption of roughly 75 per cent of all-natural resources. Furthermore, it is estimated that the 70 per cent of all CO² emissions and waste is produced in cities[1]. Similarly, more than half of the world’s agricultural land, 26.5 million km2, is needed to support the food consumption in urban areas[2]. Although the heightened use of resources is closely linked to urban lifestyles in developed countries, consumption driven by choice as opposed to need is expected to increase substantially in emerging markets as higher incomes raise demand for material possessions and modern lifestyles[3].

Urban activities have direct and indirect consequences for the natural environment in the short, medium and long term, and their scale of influence typically extends far beyond the boundaries of what is typically considered to constitute “the city”.  Growing urban demand coupled with globalized supply chains and increased global trade are impacting the local availability of resources in distant areas of the world.  Cities can only support human life and economic activity if the ecosystems on which they depend for water, food and energy are functioning. Furthermore, urban populations are also affected by changes in distant ecosystems that affect the local availability, price of commodities, water quality or climate. The sustainability of cities is thus inextricably linked to social groups and places elsewhere, whose own sustainability is linked to urban processes. This also exemplifies how local economic gains in some territories have social, economic and environmental costs in others.

Managing the indirect, distant and sometimes obscured impacts of urban activities and city-decision making requires appropriate governance mechanisms that improve cities’ accountability for the resources they rely on. For this, governance mechanisms are required to manage the teleconnections and linkages between cities and nearby and distant ecosystems, including rural areas, hinterlands and/or natural spaces. Managing these linkages to benefit ecosystems is necessary to help people, farms and businesses, including also those located in distant communities, to conserve resources that sustain life and enjoy the benefits derived from a healthy environment. In this vein, sustainably managing these linkages entails strengthening the reciprocal and repetitive flows of people and resources between urban and rural areas – urban-rural linkages. Shortening the teleconnections between cities and distant ecosystems by strengthening urban-rural linkages implies reducing the dependency and pressure on distant ecosystems, increasing the resilience of not only urban population but also of nearby rural communities. This, in turn, promotes a progressive integration of territories, facilitating the sustainable management of resources in a manner that protects and improves the ecosystem and environmental services, reduces land degradation, greenhouse gas emissions and air and water pollution, while promoting disaster risk reduction. Therefore, integrated territorial approaches, including urban-rural linkages, land- and seascape-management approaches, are vital for the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.

UN-Habitat started a process that culminated in 2019 with numerous stakeholders agreeing to Urban-Rural Linkages: Guiding Principles and Framework for Action (URL-GP) to Advance Integrated Territorial Development. The ten guiding principles seek to guide the actions of national and sub-national governments, civil society, the private sector and international organizations to begin taking steps to manage the multiple linkages and impacts that urban activities have on nearby and distant areas. The URL-GP provides a set of actions to improve the relationships between an increasingly urbanized population and the actors responsible for generation of resources from ecosystems from outside the urban areas that cities depend on. Moreover, the URL-GP provides a policy framework to harness the interactions between economic sectors, such as infrastructure, manufacturing, agriculture, water, energy and mining, which play a fundamental role in strengthening urban-rural linkages and therefore promoting integrated territorial development.  The opportunities for managing urban-rural linkages are in all three areas of sustainable development: economic, social and environmental. The URL-GP are a fundamental tool for the management of interconnected, integrated and continuous territories.

The combined impacts of climate change, biodiversity loss, and land degradation are intertwined and increasing at alarming levels. These socio-environmental challenges are themselves intertwined with enormous pressures from an urbanizing planet on terrestrial and marine ecosystems. They combine with structural socio-economic inequalities that aggravate poverty, hunger, malnutrition and disease in every region of the world. All of these interlinked challenges have been compounded by the pandemic, giving greater urgency to calls from countries, from civil society and from the private sector for “nature-based”, or ecosystem-positive”, or “ecological” transitions and solutions.

Join us at the second session of the UN-Habitat “Strengthening Communities for the Future we want: urban-rural linkages policy, legislation and governance” webinar series, co-hosted with the Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD).

[1] UN-Habitat (2010). Supporting Local Action for Biodiversity the Role of National Governments.
[2] Mc Donald et al. (2019). Nature Sustainability Research Gaps in  urban biodiversity knowledge
[3] UN-Habitat (2011). Urban Patterns for a Green Economy Optimizing Infrastructure