Selected from applicants spanning 94 countries, the latest batch of the world’s “most resilient cities” will be unveiled by the non-profit 100 Resilient Cities project in Singapore on Wednesday.
The chosen 35 cities will be those that have, in line with the ambitions of this Rockefeller Foundation-funded initiative, “demonstrated a dedicated commitment to building their own capacities to prepare for, withstand and bounce back rapidly from shocks and stresses”.
These “shocks and stresses” may vary widely between the chosen cities, ranging from natural disasters such as earthquakes and floods to long-term challenges such as social cohesion, access to healthcare, levels of violence and the free movement of people and goods for economic prosperity.
The latest round of inductees will be revealed at an Urban Resilience Summit in Singapore that will also address issues including climate change – which is influencing natural disasters that have so far caused an estimated US $2.5 trillion in worldwide damage this century – transport and communications infrastructure.
The first 33 cities were named last December, having been chosen by a group of judges including former US president Bill Clinton from nearly 400 applications. The cities ranged from Glasgow and Rotterdam in Europe to Melbourne in Australia. Dakar, Rio de Janeiro and Bangkok also made the list, along with 12 cities from North America, including New York.
Cities included in the list will be provided financial and logistical help via their own “chief resilience officer”, who will spearhead resilience efforts. Further help will be provided via public and private providers, as well as other cities in the 100 cities network.
Judith Rodin, the Rockefeller Foundation’s president, told the Guardian earlier this year: “Your city’s vulnerability to water may require an 8ft-tall dike, while another city requires natural infrastructure like archipelagoes and oyster beds. Those are very different practices, but they represent the same resilience principle, which is that you’ve got to figure out how to deal with water in a way that really works.”
The Rockefeller Foundation has said it wants to help fashion a set of standardised resilient principles for cities, pointing out that city growth means that 75% of the world’s population will live in urban areas by 2050. In 2013, the foundation announced a US $100m grant to launch the 100 Resilient Cities programme.
Watch a live stream of the 100 Resilient Cities announcement, embedded above in this article. Keep an eye out for Twitter updates via @guardiancities and #resilientcities.
