With two thirds of the world’s population projected to live in urban areas by the middle of this century, the accelerating pace of urbanisation generates crucial opportunities and challenges for sustainable development that reach far beyond city boundaries.

The UN Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) and the National Academy of Economic Strategy (NAES) of the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences (CASS) have jointly released a report on cities’ competitiveness around the world, focusing on the relationship between housing and urban competitiveness.

A distinctive feature of urbanization in the last 50 years is the expansion of urban populations and built development well beyond what was earlier conceived as the city limit, resulting in metropolitan areas.

Over the past 30 years, the number, scope and complexity of tools for assessing the environmental impact of buildings has increased dramatically.

With cities increasingly in the spotlight on the international stage, urban planning and development has become a critical issue in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

Part of a series of four entitled Urban Patterns for a Green Economy, this guide explores the compact city and its benefits within the developed and developing world’s contexts.

The purpose of this document is to provide a contextual understanding of the challenges and opportunities of climate change in relation to human settlements in Small Island Developing States (SIDS).

A National Urban Policy is a coherent set of decisions derived through a deliberate government-led process of coordinating and rallying various actors for a common vision and goal that will promote more trans-formative, productive, inclusive and resilient urban development for the long term.

The African continent is currently in the midst of simultaneously unfolding and highly significant demographic, economic, technological, environmental, urban and socio-political transitions. Africa’s economic performance is promising, with booming cities supporting growing middle classes and creating sizable consumer markets.

This report by UN-Habitat has been developed for city planners to better understand, assess and take action on climate change at the local level. The guide's strategic, values based planning framework: - promotes a participatory planning process that integrates local participation and good decision-making - provides practical tools for addressing climate change through different urban planning processes - supports the "mainstreaming" of climate change actions into other local government policy instruments.