Reimagining city resilience
IIED's Aditya V. Bahadur delivered the keynote presentation at a city resilience forum hosted by the Mayor of Helsinki and the United Nations University World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER).
Aditya V. Bahadur delivers a presentation on reimagining resilience (Photo: UNU-WIDER)
Bahadur, whose work focuses on climate-resilient urban development, warned of the increased climate risks faced by cities and presented a five-point plan for developing climate-resilient cities with steps including:
- Using decentralised climate data gathered by people on the ground and also embracing the potential of artificial intelligence, big data, and machine learning to analyse data
- Moving from top-down planning to approaches rooted in partnership, creating an enabling environment for communities to develop solutions that work for them
- Using flexible and innovative local financing methods, including city governments issuing municipal bonds to raise funds
- Teaching the people running city systems to manage increased uncertainty, for example, by offering training in adaptive management, and
- Promoting autonomous innovation by encouraging bottom-up, frugal, locally-led solutions to help people at the frontline weather extreme events.
The forum was live-streamed and is available on Helsinki's video service.
