| Accelerating sustainable urban futures: a practical guide for challenge-driven innovation in cities | 2025 | Building on the work of Challenge Works and UN-Habitat, this publication guides local government leaders and innovators on how to apply challenge-driven innovation methods in cities. It offers a step-by-step process and provides real-world examples, useful tips and relevant resources that tackle real challenges identified in cities and communities through innovation. |
| Urban-Rural Linkages and Global Pandemic Disruptions in Africa Impacts on Mobility, Spatial Interaction and Food Systems in Cameroon, Kenya, Niger State (Nigeria), Senegal and Zimbabwe | 2025 | Many development practitioners have, until recently, viewed urban and rural areas as two mutually exclusive territories. However, this does not reflect the realities of the spatial and sectoral linkages between urban and rural areas. The two territories are two ends of a continuum of human settlements which are spatially and functionally interconnected and interdependent through physical, social, economic and environmental linkages that are continuously changing in time and space. During the coronavirus (Covid-19) pandemic, the spatial and functional linkages between urban and rural areas were greatly affected due to lockdown measures that were enforced to control the spread of Covid-19. Lockdown measures led to the disruption of transportation and flow of food, people, goods, services, resources and capital between urban and rural areas. Food supply and distribution chains were largely disrupted and therefore affecting access to and availability of food in both rural and urban areas. In particular, Covid-19 exposed the interconnected vulnerabilities between food production, distribution and consumption within the context of city-region food systems. As such, it became evident that urban-rural linkages must be considered more carefully in the short, intermediate and long-term responses to future global pandemics. This calls for renewed territorial planning and policy agenda for national, regional and local governments, especially in sub-Saharan Africa. Sustainable urban development strategies need to consider urban-rural linkages and context in order to enhance more inclusive and resilient cities and human settlements. |
| A Step-by-Step Guide for a People-Centred Smart City Strategy: A Playbook for National, Regional, and Local Governments | 2025 | This playbook provides governments with a practical, people-centred approach to urban digital transformation. It offers a step-by-step guidance, tools, access to relevant resources and case studies to help cities design inclusive, ethical, and resilient smart city strategies grounded in community needs and human rights. |
| Future Cities Advisory Outlook 2025: AI and Cities | 2025 | بحلول عام 2050، سيقيم في المدن 2.3 مليار شخص إضافي، وهو ما يعادل إجمالي عدد سكان العالم في عام 1950. ويضع هذا التوسع السريع ضغطًا هائلًا على الإسكان والنقل والطاقة، ويرجع ذلك إلى حد كبير إلى أوجه القصور البنيوية في التحضر التقليدي. وفي جوهره، تتناول «التوقعات الاستشارية لمدن المستقبل 2025: الذكاء الاصطناعي والمدن» سؤالًا طموحًا واحدًا: هل يمكن لـ10% من موارد المدينة الحالية أن تدعم تنميتها المستدامة العالية الجودة؟ ومن خلال تحويل التركيز من استهلاك الموارد إلى التحسين الذكي، يجادل هذا التقرير بأن الكفاءة الجذرية هي المسار الوحيد القابل للتطبيق نحو المستقبل. ولمواجهة هذا التحدي، يستعرض التقرير بشكل منهجي كيف يقود الذكاء الاصطناعي ثورة في نماذج التنمية العالمية. ويعتمد على نطاق واسع على ممارسات عقل المدينة (City Brain) في الصين، موضحًا كيف يمكن لدمج البيانات والنماذج والقوة الحاسوبية أن ينقل الحوكمة الحضرية من الجزر المنعزلة المجزأة إلى أنظمة شمولية تآزرية. وتعتمد هذه الممارسات على نهج يضع الإنسان في المركز، مع التركيز على الخدمات القائمة على السيناريوهات التي تكسر الحواجز بين الإدارات. ومن خلال تجميع هذه الخبرات، يقدم التقرير رؤية تقنية شاملة عبر ستة مجالات حضرية رئيسية، ويضع خارطة طريق حاسمة من أربع مراحل لتوجيه التحول الرقمي. وبعيدًا عن الأطر النظرية، يقدم التقرير مجموعة أدوات عملية تتضمن اثنتي عشرة دراسة حالة معمقة من الحكومات المحلية والمؤسسات التكنولوجية الصينية. وتعرض هذه الأمثلة بشكل واقعي كيفية تحقيق كفاءة الموارد عبر المشاركة الذكية. ويختتم التقرير بتوصيات استراتيجية ومبادرات التعاون العالمي في مجال «الذكاء الاصطناعي + المدينة»، داعيًا أصحاب المصلحة إلى تجاوز قيود النمو التقليدية والسعي نحو نموذج حضاري جديد: حياة أفضل بموارد أقل. |
| Textiles-as-a-service - leasing coveralls for kids in Norwegian kindergartens | 2025 | |
| Urban Resilience Action Plan (URAP) for Kerkennah Archipelago, Tunisia: Planning for Climate, Urban, and Biodiversity Action | 2025 | |
| Assessment of the Circular Economy in Bangladesh’s Buildings and Construction Sector | 2025 | This assessment pilots the National Circularity Assessment Framework for Buildings in Bangladesh, establishing a baseline for circularity in the buildings and construction sector. It maps material flows, environmental footprint, and socio-economic impacts, and sets out recommendations to accelerate the country’s circular transition. |
| Lebanon – Building destruction and debris quantities assessment - Bekaa Governorate | 2025 | |
| 未来城市顾问展望2024 数字城市治理 | 2025 | Cities face tremendous challenges, demanding advanced and effective urban governance measures and tools. Digital solutions offer transformative potential through resources optimization, services enhancement, and inclusivity development. The Future Cities Advisory Outlook 2024 draws a clear technological landscape and implementation roadmap; collects 10 innovative practices from Chinese cities and enterprises; and launches Global Digital Urban Governance Initiatives. By embracing tech-driven collaboration, cities can build a more sustainable and inclusive future. |
| STRATEGIC PRIORITIES FOR UN-HABITAT AFGHANISTAN 2026–2027 | 2025 | Afghanistan is a country of extremes: extreme beauty, an extremely strategic location, and a country with many natural resources and extremely resilient people but is still a country where people face extreme socio-economic and human rights challenges. The Afghanistan Humanitarian Needs and Response Plan (HRNP) 2025 names climate change-induced and natural hazards, inadequate or lack of service provision, decades of conflict and geopolitical dynamics, a weak economy and the socio-political restrictions (among many others) reasons, why almost half of the population were estimated to require humanitarian assistance of any form. UN-Habitat has been supporting the people of Afghanistan since 1992. As the agency has just launched a new strategic plan at global level for 2026-2029, this paper focuses on strategic priorities for UN-Habitat Afghanistan for 2026 and 2027. Those priorities have been defined through analysis of the agency’s (and other partners’) data and the consultations with the communities and people in Afghanistan and are in alignment with the agency’s overall mandate, the global priorities and the agency’s role in the United Nations family in Afghanistan and the agreed upon priorities at country level (UNSFA 2023-2027). For our team at UN-Habitat Afghanistan, those priorities will be: A. Support the most vulnerable people by creating and enabling dignified living conditions and livelihood opportunities with a specific focus on those living in unplanned, underserviced and informal settlements B. Enhance preparedness, response, recovery, and reconstruction C. Accelerate environmental and climate actions to save lives, livelihoods and assets Acknowledging that women and girls, displaced people but also other marginalized groups are most at risk of being left behind in Afghanistan at the time of writing, we are committed to inclusive, participatory and gender-sensitive solutions and striving towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and based on the New Urban Agenda as a shared vision for a better and more sustainable future. |