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Urbanisation

The cost of non-rurality

Date of Editorial Board meeting: 
Publication date: 
Monday, June 5, 2023
Abstract in English: 
Rapid urbanisation in several EU Member States and the ensuing population shift from rural areas towards urban centres are generally treated in economic literature as a necessity for generating growth and wellbeing. In the last two decades, however, the overly positive assessment of this trend has shifted.

Globalisation has put increasing pressure on agriculture, food processing industries and other local cottage and SME enterprises. This has led to accelerating changes in the balance between rural and urban areas and has deeply impacted the overall socio-economic fabric of regions.
At the same time, declining rural populations make many rural communities unsustainable. Once inhabitants decide to leave areas due to falling living standards, the remaining population suffers from the further deprivation of goods and services, driving even more people to leave. Several studies have been assessing the costs associated with these changes, in particular their impact on the viability of rural communities. However, they generally fall short of the holistic assessment required, as the decline and shift of populations also create further negative spillovers on the rest of the economy, for example on urban areas that are usually at the receiving end of the influx of rural populations.
This report aims to contribute to the debate on EU rural development policy by presenting a methodology to understand the net costs and benefits of investing in rural areas to society as a whole. By doing so, it asks whether rural depopulation is just a rural problem or whether the consequences have a bearing on the whole of society, and in particular urban areas.
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53
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Megatrends in Africa

Date of Editorial Board meeting: 
Publication date: 
Wednesday, December 4, 2019
Abstract in English: 
The reports are not academic research as such. The authors are academically qualified researchers, however, and they base their findings on academic studies. In this study, six major trends in Africa are defined as megatrends: population growth, climate change, urbanisation, migration, techno­logical development and democratic development.
Megatrends in Africa are deep and long-term transformation processes that are irreversible. They can and should be mitigated, but will inevitably require adaptation as well. The trends also have an element of foresight, in regards to how they are set to develop in the future.
All the megatrends are interlinked and affect each other. Population growth and climate change can be seen as mega-megatrends that have an especially strong effect on the other trends.
The study contains reports on all six megatrends, which are examined through a Pan-African lens. The study also includes a summary of all megatrends and the interaction of their effects.
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56
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Global Trendometer - Essays on medium- and long-term global trends

Date of Editorial Board meeting: 
Publication date: 
Tuesday, July 17, 2018
Abstract in English: 
The EU faces challenges from the outside and the inside. Most of those are the symptoms of big underlying trends, and handling them needs foresight. The Global Trendometer tries to provide foresight for decision makers in the EU by analysing the changes in these long-term trends. This publication does not offer answers or make recommendations. It presents summarised information derived from a range of carefully selected sources. This issue of the Global Trendometer analyses long-term trends on India, the labour-share of income, and democracy and artificial intelligence. It also features two-pagers on geoengineering, remittances, food security in China, economic waves, the US after Trump, public procurement and deep fakes.
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56
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What role for cars in tomorrow’s world?

Date of Editorial Board meeting: 
Publication date: 
Thursday, June 8, 2017
Abstract in English: 
What lies ahead for cars? The need to improve air quality and the quest for more fluid means of mobility, and sometimes dogmatic viewpoints have led some to want to exclude cars from towns.
Despite the undeniable progress that has been made to mitigate its impact, cars remain a source of undesirable externalities. In France, transport represented 26.9% of greenhouse gas emissions in 2013 and 28% of particulate emissions in the Île-de-France region.
Congestion in city centres leads to increase in both of these emissions and a considerable loss of time (estimated at 38 minutes per day in Paris) and money for those who drive.
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190
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Future of Cities: An Overview of the Evidence

Date of Editorial Board meeting: 
Publication date: 
Monday, May 9, 2016
Abstract in English: 
Cities matter to the UK’s future. They are already concentrations of population and employment, and will be home to much of the country’s future population and economic growth. Cities are centres of commercial, cultural, institutional, and socia life. In short, they are both central to the shaping and delivery of national policy objectives, and the locations where broad social, environmental and economic changes play out in practice.
UK cities are highly diverse, each with a distinctive history and its own set of relationships with its neighbours and with central government.
This Foresight project has developed a broad evidence base and consulted local actors to understand challenges and opportunities from those most experienced in the issues affecting UK cities. The single theme which runs throughout this work is providing the best possible evidence for national and city level decision-makers.
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66
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Inspiring Future Cities & Urban Services: Shaping the Future of Urban Development & Services Initiative

Date of Editorial Board meeting: 
Publication date: 
Wednesday, April 6, 2016
Abstract in English: 
The report highlights the emerging technologies and business models that are changing the way urban services are delivered and proposes a 10-step action plan to enable cities to navigate the journey of urban transformation.
Cities are growing at a rapid rate, with the global urban population set to increase by 2.5 billion by 2050. People continue to migrate to cities for better economic, social and creative opportunities. Growing cities are dense in terms of land use and, at the same time, are difficult to govern because of their diverse social and economic fabric.
While cities battle issues such as climate change, social segregation and economic development, they increasingly have to do so with fewer resources as they face budgetary constraints and battle with suboptimal devolution of funds and functions. City administrations are using emerging
business models and technologies to deliver services. The use of technology and changing ownership models have disrupted the way excess capacities within cities are efficiently utilized. However, technology is not a silver-bullet solution to urban problems. To holistically address such problems cities need to transform planning, governance and regulatory aspects.
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60
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World Migration Report 2015

Date of Editorial Board meeting: 
Publication date: 
Wednesday, March 16, 2016
Abstract in English: 
We live in a world which is becoming increasingly urban, where more and more people are moving to cities. Over 54 per cent of people across the globe were living in urban areas in 2014 (UN DESA, 2014).1 The current urban population of 3.9 billion is expected to grow in the next few decades to some 6.4 billion by 2050 (ibid.). It is estimated that three million people around the world are moving to cities every week (UN-Habitat, 2009). Migration is driving much of the increase in urbanization, making cities much more diverse places in which to live.
Nearly one in five of the world foreign-born population resides in established global gateway cities (Çağlar, 2014). In many of these cities such as Sydney, London and New York, migrants represent over a third of the population and, in some cities such as Brussels and Dubai, migrants account for more than half of the population.
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234
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Urban Development Recommendations for the Government of India

Date of Editorial Board meeting: 
Publication date: 
Wednesday, April 1, 2015
Abstract in English: 
The World Economic Forum’s Future of Urban Development & Services (FUDS) Initiative serves as a partner in transformation for cities around the world as they address urban challenges. This report is the third in the FUDS Initiative. The first two presented the results of the initiative’s engagement with three Chinese cities: Tianjin (Tianjin Champion City Strategy), and Dalian and Zhangjiakou (Dalian and Zhangjiakou Champion City Strategy). With each of these cities, the Forum conducted a “Champion City Activity” in cooperation with the China Center for Urban Development and the World Bank.
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38
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Governance of Metropolitan Regions. European and Global Experiences

Date of Editorial Board meeting: 
Publication date: 
Monday, June 20, 2011
Abstract in English: 
For many years now the Committee of the Regions has been building a reputation of being "the EU's Assembly of Regional and Local Representatives".
It decided to contribute to the debate on metropolitan governance by pulling resources together with a long-standing international partner like the Forum of Federations (FoF). The going together with such a renowned global academic network on federalism in this project, provided the CoR with an unprecedented mix of analytical and policy expertise on urban and metropolitan issues to be able to offer to our members and the rest of the EU institutions.
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183
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Global Strategic Trends - Out to 2045

Date of Editorial Board meeting: 
Publication date: 
Wednesday, April 30, 2014
Abstract in English: 
Global Strategic Trends (GST) describes a strategic context for those in the Ministry of Defence (MOD) and wider Government who are involved in developing long term plans, policies and capabilities. Without a strategic context there is a risk that planners, policymakers and capability developers may assume a future that adheres to preconceived thoughts and assumptions.

As well as providing a strategic context, this 5th edition of Global Strategic Trends (GST 5) identifies long term threats and opportunities, out to 2045. GST does not attempt to predict the future, it cannot. Rather, it describes those phenomena that could have a significant impact on the future and combines these differing perspectives to produce a multifaceted picture of possible outcomes.
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