Goal 11. Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable

Potential and Illustrative Core Indicators:

Indicator 72: Percentage of urban population living in slums or informal settlements (MDG Indicator)

Rationale and definition: This indicator measures the percentage of the urban population living in slums or informal settlements, as defined by UN-Habitat. The indicator is calculated by taking the number of people living in slums of a city divided by the total population of this city, expressed as a percentage. At the country level, this percentage is calculated by taking the total number of people living in slums of all the cities of a country divided by the total population living in all the cities of the given country.145

UN-Habitat has developed a household level definition of a slum household in order to be able to use existing household-level survey and census data to identify slum dwellers among the urban population. A slum household is a household that lacks any one of the following five elements:

• Access to improved water (access to sufficient amount of water for family use, at an affordable price, available to household members without being subject to extreme effort)

• Access to improved sanitation (access to an excreta disposal system, either in the form of a private toilet or a public toilet shared with a reasonable number of people)

• Security of tenure (evidence of documentation to prove secure tenure status or de facto or perceived protection from evictions)

• Durability of housing (permanent and adequate structure in non-hazardous location)

• Sufficient living area (not more than two people sharing the same room)

Disaggregation: By sex of head of household and age.

Comments and limitations: Not all slums are the same and not all slum dwellers suffer from the same degree of deprivation. The degree of deprivation depends on how many of the five conditions that define slums are prevalent within a slum household. Approximately one-fifth of slum households live in extremely poor conditions, defined by UN-Habitat as lacking more than three basic shelter needs.146 The definition of the water and sanitation component of the index may need to be reviewed to ensure full consistency with the water supply and sanitation indicators currently under development by the WHO/UNICEF JMP (indicators 57 and 58).

Preliminary assessment of current data availability by Friends of the Chair: A

Potential lead agency or agencies: UN-Habitat and the Global City Indicators Facility (GCIF).

Indicator 4: Percentage of women and men in urban areas with security of tenure, measured by (i) percentage with documented rights to housing, and (ii) percentage who do not fear arbitrary eviction

Rationale and definition: The absence of security of tenure for urban dwellers over their housing can have important implications for economic development, poverty reduction, and social inclusion. This proposed new indicator comprises two components: (i) percentage with documented rights to housing and (ii) percentage who do not fear arbitrary eviction. Documentation and perception provide critical and complementary information on tenure security. In addition, they both highlight outcomes and on-the-

145 Global City Indicators Facility. See: http://mdgs.un.org/unsd/mdg/seriesdetail.aspx?srid=710

146 UN-Habitat, (2006), State of the World’s Cities 2006/7.

See: http://www.unhabitat.org/documents/media_centre/sowcr2006/sowcr%205.pdf

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ground realities. The proposed focus on “documented rights” is flexible enough to cover a range of tenure rights in different country contexts. Because documentation alone, while important, is often not sufficient to gauge true tenure security, the perception measure provides valuable complementary information. In addition, the perception measure may facilitate more useful comparisons across countries.

Disaggregation: By sex and income. Further opportunities for disaggregation to be reviewed.

Comments and limitations: The rural component of this indicator is included under target 6c.

Preliminary assessment of current data availability by Friends of the Chair: To be determined.

Potential lead agency or agencies: UN-Habitat, UNDP

Indicator 73: Percentage of urban households with regular solid waste collection

Rationale and definition: Urban households produce substantial amounts of solid waste that must be collected regularly and disposed of properly in order to maintain healthy and sanitary living conditions. Uncollected solid waste can end up in drains, causing blockages that result in flooding and unsanitary conditions. Mosquitos that spread malaria and dengue can breed in blocked drains.147 In addition, some constituents of solid waste, such as organic matter, can attract flies and rodents that spread gastro intestinal and parasitic diseases.148

Sustainable solid waste management is essential. Source reduction, recycling, and composting are preferred methods and should be promoted, as they reduce demand on scarce environmental resources, reduce energy use, and minimize the quantity of waste that must eventually be disposed of via incinerators and landfills.

UN-Habitat (2009) has specified that solid waste collection can include collection from individual households, regular dumpster group collection, but not local dumps to which the household must carry garbage. Solid waste collection should be considered regular and adequate if it occurs at least once a week. Disaggregation: Opportunities for disaggregation to be reviewed.

Comments and limitations: In many countries, monitoring systems for solid waste collection are weak, with data that is incomplete or not available. The development of adequate monitoring systems may require a major effort in some countries.

Preliminary assessment of current data availability by Friends of the Chair: A

Potential lead agency or agencies: Data on solid waste collection may be available from municipal bodies, public services, and private contractors dealing with solid waste collection and disposal, or NGOs. Within cities, waste collection may vary from one area to another depending on the level of tax payment.149 Data can be presented to UN-Habitat at the city or national urban level.

Indicator 74: Percentage of people within [0.5] km of public transit running at least every [20] minutes

Rationale and definition: This indicator measures access to reliable public transportation, using a proxy of percentage of population within [0.5] kilometers of public transit running at least every [20] minutes. Public

147 UN-Habitat, (2009), Urban Indicator Guidelines: Better Information, Better Cities, Monitoring the Habitat Agenda and the Millennium Development Goals – Slum Target, Nairobi, Kenya: UN-Habitat.

148 Sustainable Communities Index. See : http://www.sustainablecommunitiesindex.org/indicators/view/4 149 Ibid, and UN-Habitat, (2009).

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transportation is defined as a shared passenger transport service that is available to the general public. It includes buses, trolleys, trams, trains, subways, and ferries. It excludes taxis, car pools, and hired buses, which are not shared by strangers without prior arrangement.

Effective and low-cost transportation for mobility is critical for urban poverty reduction and economic development because it provides access to jobs, health care, education services, and more. The Partnership on Sustainable Low-Carbon Transport (SLoCaT)150 and others propose indicators for urban access to sustainable transport that include: mean daily travel time, percentage of income spent by urban families on transport, and percentage of households within 500 meters of good quality, affordable public transportation.

Disaggregation: Households should be disaggregated spatially and in terms of potential disadvantage (such as gender, age, disability) to ensure access for all.

Comments and limitations: No internationally agreed methodology exists for measuring convenience and service quality of public transportation. In addition, global data on urban transport systems do not exist.

Although some data exists for public transport companies and individual cities, harmonized and comparable data on the world level do not yet exist. To obtain this data would require going down to municipal/city level, as urban transport is most often not under direct responsibility of national governments. In general, there is currently a lack of data on the number of people with access to mass transit and on transport infrastructure.151

Preliminary assessment of current data availability by Friends of the Chair: B

Potential lead agency or agencies: UN-Habitat.

Indicator 75: [Indicator on the deployment of a sustainable development strategy for each urban agglomeration above [250,000] – to be developed

Rationale and definition: Sustainable development in urban areas requires long-term strategies that integrate infrastructure development, the provision of urban services, deep decarbonization efforts and land use. Such strategies are specific to each city and therefore need to be developed at the city level. Public discussion and consultation on such strategies will ensure that they meet the needs of the entire urban population, including businesses. We propose developing an indicator that tracks which of the larger urban centers, e.g. with populations above 250,000, have developed a sustainable development strategy. Ideally each country would develop a national registry of such strategies and collect key performance targets identified for each city. Such an indicator will help focus attention on the long-term sustainable development needs of cities, and promote citywide dialogues on appropriate sustainable development pathways.

This indicator would follow up on the work of Agenda 21, the non-binding, voluntarily implemented action plan on sustainable development that the United Nations developed at the UNCED in Rio in 1992. Chapter 28 of this document recommended that local governments take steps to implement the plan locally, and these programs are often referred to as “Local Agenda 21”.

Disaggregation: By city and province, by city size.

Comments and limitations: To be reviewed.

Preliminary assessment of current data availability by Friends of the Chair: C

Potential lead agency or agencies: World Bank, UN-Habitat.

150 Sayeg, P., Starkey, P., and Huizenga, C., (2014), Updated Draft Results Framework on Sustainable Transport, SLoCAT (Partnership on Sustainable Low Carbon Transport). See: http://www.slocat.net/results-framework-sustainable-transport

151 UN Statistics Division, (2014).

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Indicator 76: Urban green space per capita

Rationale and definition: This indicator measures the amount of urban green space available to residents of a city. Urban green space is defined as including: amenity areas and allotments, formal open space and outdoor recreation areas, informal open space and children’s playgrounds, public parks, heritage parks, nature conservation areas and woodlands. This indicator is expressed in square meters per resident. An alternative measure is individuals’ distance to an urban green space, but such a metric would have much higher data requirements.

Urban green spaces are important for quality of life in increasingly urbanized societies. Empirical evidence indicates that the presence of natural areas serves social and psychological purposes (recreation, relaxation, improved health), as well as providing environmental and ecological services (cooling, water management, carbon capture).152

Disaggregation: Opportunities for disaggregation to be reviewed. Comments and limitations: Numerous tools are available for assessing urban green space. Some are universal, like remote sensing, and some are location-specific such as on-site surveys.

Preliminary assessment of current data availability by Friends of the Chair: B

Potential lead agency or agencies: UN-Habitat.

Additional indicators that countries may consider:

• City Biodiversity Index (Singapore Index). Self-assessment tool for cities to evaluate their biodiversity conservation efforts along 23 indicators.153

• [Indicator on urban-rural economic linkages] - to be developed: this indicator will measure the economic and social links between urban, peri-urban and rural areas

152 Chiesura, A., (2004), The role of urban parks for the sustainable city, Landscape and Urban Planning, 68:1, pp. 129-138. 153 Rodricks, S., (2010), Singapore City Biodiversity Index, Geneva: Switzerland: The Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity (TEEB). Revised working draft (July 25, 2014)