The report Linking Cities to Finance-Indonesia March 2012 is now available for download on the Useful Publications page under the Knowledge Materials section.

The purpose of this report is to give an overview on the possible sources of infrastructure funds available for Cities in Indonesia and how these can be accessed.

This report consists of two main parts:

1) Part I summarizes the access to financing for Cities as well as challenges and findings.

2) Part II details the general conditions and procedures of each financing mechanism available for Cities.

The report, to be submitted to the UN Habitat, is jointly prepared by URDI and YIPD, the National Partner Organizations of CDIA.

To download a copy of the report, please click on the following link:
NPO Publications

The CDIA China Office has released its first regular Newsletter. This issue provides insight on how CDIA-China bridges the gap between development plans and infrastructure investments in various cities in China.

The Newsletter also features articles on trainings and workshops that Chinese cities and National Partner Organizations participated in. These trainings help participants learn about effective urban infrastructure planning.

A copy of the Newsletter can be found at this link: CDIA CHINA Newsletter

CDIA, in collaboration with CITYNET and the Bangkok Metropolitan Authority (BMA), contributed input to an Experts Group Meeting bringing together a select number of urban specialists from Thailand, Indonesia, Philippines, Vietnam, Japan and Korea, held March 8-9, 2012 in Bangkok. The objective of the meeting focused on extracting common insights that could be gleaned from the recent flooding in Bangkok and other urban floods elsewhere in Asia.

While much discussion has previously focused on technical solutions for flood control, many of the associated problems can be traced to incomplete decisions on urban infrastructure investments and implementation. Many of these original decisions suffered from not taking a more integrated view to project development. Additionally, the lack of an inclusive approach in making investment decisions resulted in impacts being most severely felt by low-income communities.

The proceedings of the event are being documented into a set of lessons learnt that can be of relevance not only to Bangkok, but to local governments in the region and will be distributed through the CITYNET and CDIA networks.

CDIA has been invited as one of the supporting organizations at the World Cities Summit (WCS) 2012, which will be held on 1-4 July 2012 at the Sands Expo & Convention Center, Marina Bay Sands Singapore.

The World Cities Summit (WCS) is the global platform for government leaders and industry experts to address liveable and sustainable city challenges, share integrated urban solutions and forge partnerships. Under the theme “Liveable and Sustainable Cities – Integrated Urban Solutions”, the World Cities Summit 2012 will explore how cities can build resilience and improve their quality of life and environment by adopting integrated solutions to increasingly complex challenges. Strategically sited in the Asia Pacific region where many cities are experiencing unprecedented growth, Singapore is the ideal host for this Summit. After the success of the first two Summits, World Cities Summit 2012 is expected to attract more than 3,000 government leaders, policy makers and industry experts from around the world.

For more details please visit: www.worldcitiessummit.com.sg

Duration              Twelve months (with possibility of extension subject to performance and availability of funds)

Starting date:    As soon as possible (May 2012)

Duty station:      CDIA, Manila, Philippines

Application Link:  http://csrn.adb.org/csrn/home.htm

Background

The Cities Development Initiative for Asia (CDIA), is an initiative developed with support from the Asian Development Bank (ADB) in cooperation with German Development Co-operation (GDC, with the Deutsche Gesellschaft fuer Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH as its operational lead agency), Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (Sida), the Government of Austria and Shanghai Municipal Government. The long term mission of CDIA is to contribute to the promotion of sustainable and equitable urban development, leading to improved environmental and living conditions for all in Asian cities.

The strategic objective of CDIA is to bridge the gap between strategic city development planning on the one hand and urban policies, services and infrastructure project preparation on the other by assisting city governments with pre-project preparation and capacity development. In attempting to achieve this, CDIA supports the identification and pre-structuring of appropriate urban infrastructure development projects [1]and building management capacity of medium size cities with focus on cities with population from approximately 250,000 up to five million people. In these cities, CDIA supports the implementation of existing city development strategies or comprehensive development plans for socially, economically and environmentally equitable and sustainable infrastructure and urban services. [2]

The operational objectives of CDIA, given the above overall strategic objective, are to improve urban infrastructure and services management through:

a)      strengthening of local institutional structures and arrangements for local policy frameworks on urban management and the development of urban capital investment infrastructure and services projects, including the upgrading of local governance systems and enhancement of the city revenue base to maximize funding options and capacity; and

b)      providing technical assistance in project structuring to bring priority infrastructure project conceptsto a pre-feasibility stage from where standard project feasibility studies acceptable to (and, if required, funded by) development financing institutions can be applied.

Organizational Setting, Reporting Relationships and Focus

Under the supervision of the ADB CDIA Manager and the GIZ CDIA Programme Coordinator the incumbent will take part in the day to day operational activities of the CDIA Core Management Team (CMT). With a focus on environmental sustainability, the main tasks of the incumbent will be to support the following activities of the CDIA: marketing of CDIA to cities and other partners, support to cities in project application preparation, evaluation and appraisal, preparation of pre-feasibility study (PFS) phase projects including procurement of consultants, capacity development and networking with local and national governments, financiers and other partners, and development of work procedures and strategies.

Specific tasks:

Within the CDIA CMT the Senior Urban Environment Engineer will be responsible for performing the following tasks:

a)      Safeguarding the quality of CDIA’s support work from a municipal engineering perspective.

b)      Assume internal first line support management responsibilities for CDIA work in one or more countries.

c)       Develop and lead the work with a number of local governments in urban infrastructure project programming, prioritization and pre-feasibility study (PFS) preparation.

d)      Develop Terms of Reference for requested support projects, as well as bidding documents for technical assistance in accordance with the preferred financing modality.

e)      Backstop procurement of consultants and implementation, monitoring and evaluation of PFS implemented under the CDIA initiative.

f)       Support local governments, consultants and other partners in the CDIA network from the vantage point of his/her professional perspective.

g)      Support and backstop other CDIA CMT members in, for instance, preparation of Terms of Reference and procurement of consultants based on his/her engineering expertise and professional background.

h)      Support the development of CDIA working procedures, strategies and core product development, particularly regarding engineering and environmental issues.

i)        Participate in CDIA Core Management Team meetings and internal training activities.

j)        Support the CDIA CMT in capacity development (training programs and workshops, seminars, conferences, on-the-job training) with cities, national governments, national partner organizations (NPO) and other networking partners related to particularly project structuring, PFS guidelines and engineering and environmental aspects.

k)      Participate in the dissemination of CDIA activities to a broader audience and stakeholders.

l)        Give input to (the identification of strategic priorities for) the design of future cooperation programs between primarily CDIA and Sida but also ADB and other present or future financing partners (EIB, DIFID, SECO, AFD etc.) through participation in meetings, seminars and fora, for instance.

m)    Perform other duties as required.

Qualifications and professional profile

Minimum of a Masters degree in municipal, civil, chemical, environmental or similar engineering with demonstrable focus on urban environmental infrastructure issues, with a minimum of fifteen (15) years’ of experience in urban development projects, preferably in several engineering sectors. This will comprise significant experience within programme/project formulation, capacity development within the sector(s) and preparation, design and preferably implementation of large-scale urban infrastructure projects in multi-sectoral teams. Significant experience with an integrated, cross-cutting and cross-sectoral approach towards sustainable urban development will be required. A sizeable part of the above working experience will have been in developing countries, preferably in Asia. The incumbent should have broad knowledge of the environmental, economic and social conditions of Asia.

Female experts with suitable qualifications are strongly encouraged to apply for this position.

Languages

Fluency in oral and written English is essential. Language ability in any major Asian language will be an added advantage.

Global Energy Basel (GEB) is the leading policy dialogue and investment platform for the promotion of sustainable infrastructure in cities. This year’s summit will be held on 21-22 February 2012 in Basel, Switzerland.

The summit offers solutions for confronting the challenges of resource scarcity and energy security, as well as addressing global warming targets.

The conference will consist of plenary sessions, roundtables, workshops and investment forums featuring senior decision makers including mayors, national and international policymakers, heads of commercial banks, pension funds, private industry, NGOs and others.

The variety of session formats allows participants to develop a deeper understanding of the topics through engagement on strategic and tactical levels.

For more information click on the following link: www.globalenergybasel.com

The CDIA supported High-Level Urban Policy Roundtable held at the Asian Development Bank (ADB), Manila, Philippines on 14 November 2011, saw an eminent group of twenty political leaders, leading urban specialists and concerned civic leaders, deliberating on the role of Asian cities in the world economy and what Asian cities should do in order to maintain and enhance their competitive edge, while ensuring that their development is inclusive and sustainable.

The group called upon Asian countries to make urbanization (and urban infrastructure development in particular) a key instrument for enhancing growth, combating poverty, addressing climate change, and serving as a stabilizing factor in the regional and global economic system. The focus of the Roundtable was on the need to develop institutional mechanisms providing adequate incentives to make this happen.

The Roundtable discussions led into the formulation of a Manila declaration on incentivizing Asia’s urban future. A Background Paper had been prepared and circulated as the basis to facilitate discussion among participants to the High-level Roundtable.

Copies of the Summary Report and supporting documents may be downloaded here:

• Summary Report
• Annex 1: List of Participants
• Annex 2: Background Paper
• Annex 3: Manila Declaration

The Stakeholder’s Forum represents the ‘demand-side’ of the CDIA programme and provides an opportunity for members to provide feedback on selected issues so as to help guide the Initiative to make it more responsive to the local and regional needs.

A copy of the Draft Agenda can be downloaded here. For those that wish to attend, but have not yet sent in their registration form, we urge you to complete it and send it in by November 9th, a copy of the Registration Form can be downloaded here, or you may visit this link for an online version of the form. CDIA is able to provide the SHF with a limited number of sponsorships to attend, and these are primarily to support members from city organizations in attending the event. Others will be considered if funds are still remaining.

Concurrently, as for previous meetings, we would ask you to take a few minutes to also complete the SHF Survey by November 15th. It can be accessed by clicking the following link: http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/TWHNHZY

The training programme to be held in January 11 – 20, 2012 in Singapore is jointly sponsored by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Singapore and Cities Development Initiative for Asia (CDIA) under the Singapore-CDIA Third Country Training Programme (TCTP) and will be conducted by the Singapore Civil Service College and CDIA.

This is the third staging of such a programme and the course will include the following subjects:

• Urban Infrastructure Project Prioritization and Programming
• Urban Infrastructure Finance
• Urban Infrastructure Services contributing to urban sustainability (environment, social development, economic development)
• Marketing of infrastructure investment projects to potential financiers
• Using public private partnership (PPP) arrangements for infrastructure investments.
• Using pre-feasibility studies to help bridge the gap between development plans and project implementation.

The purpose of the Course is to enable participants to learn about effective urban infrastructure planning, programming and implementation of infrastructure investment projects, which contribute to sustainable urban development.