GFSRD-Global Centre for Rural Urban Linkages Studies joins Regional Centre for Urban and Environmental Studies, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh (India) under the auspices of Indian Council of Social Science Research (ICSSR), Ministry of Education, Government of India, New Delhi to organise a two days National Seminar on “ Urban 20 India: Emerging Perspective, Challenges and Way Forward” on February 27-28, 2024 at Lucknow in hybrid mode.
Centre for Regional Planning, National Institute of Technology, Malang, Indonesia, Centre for People and Environment, Bangladesh and National Association of Professional Social Work in India ( NAPSWI), India were the other Knowledge Partners for the national seminar.
The main objective of the seminar was to discuss and deliberate upon the pertinent issues, dimensions and aspects of Urban 20 India in the context of G20. India’s G20 presidency is a chance to demonstrate that policies and practices adopted and spread by cities have strong consequences for achieving global development targets. The Urban 20 engagement group emphasizes that efforts at the city level may produce long-term beneficial outcomes for the globe, echoing the G20 theme of ‘One Earth, One Family, and One Future’. The U20 aims to shift from intention to action and to create a blueprint for global transformation that will be driven by cities by addressing policy and practice gaps at all levels of governance. Cities must be enabled to strike the proper balance between economic success and environmental effect; growing densities and sprawl; diversity and social cohesion; technical developments and digital gap; and the numerous other tensions that metropolitan regions confront.
The seminar was inaugurated by Er. A. K. Gupta, Additional Director, Regional Centre for Urban and Environmental Studies, Lucknow. In his inaugural address, he highlighted the imperative need of balancing the elements of nature i.e. water, soil and air. He also highlighted the need of mainstreaming climate change adaptation, environmentally responsible behaviour, and conservation of water resources with focus on rain water harvesting, rejuvenation of water bodies and recusing and reuse of waste water. Prior to it, Dr. A. K. Singh, Seminar Convenor highlighted the rational, objectives, and thematic issues of the seminar. He said that the Urban 20 cycle has been planned to prioritize several priorities.
A special session was on SDG in Urban India being organised in hybrid mode in academic collaboration with national and international academic institutions of repute. In that session, Dr. Jayanta Choudhury, Member G20 National Committee – University Connect Programme and founder GFSRD presented a conceptual framework of SDGs, the importance of localisation, policy initiatives for urban centres, emerging challenges and strategies to cope up.
Dr. Maria Christina Indarwati, Faculty, Centre for Urban and Regional Planning, National Institute of Technology, Indonesia presented practices of food security in urban areas.
Dr. Pranjal Kumar Phukan, Woxen University, Hyderabad highlighted on exploring the ecology and safeguarding the environmental health of inland waters and Dr. Meenu Sharma, Associate Professor and Head, Department of Public Administration, The Assam Royal Global University Guwahati Assam highlighted on difference initiatives taken by the central as state government towards urban development in North east Indian states.
Importance and strategy for urban forestry was discussed by Prof. Prodyut Bhattacharya, University School of Environment Management, Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University, New Delhi while PadmajaTamuli. Assistant Professor. AmitySchool of Communication, AmityUniversity,Kolkata emphasises on partnership with Corporate sectors for city management through CSR fund.