[Urbanstudy] NIUA Workshop on World Development Report 2009

[Vinay Baindur]

http://www.niua.org/upcoming%20seminars/wdr/wdr.htm

Workshop on World Development Report 2009: Reshaping Economic Geography

Organized by:



- Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India

- National Institute of Urban Affairs





Date: 12 March 2009

Venue: Conference Room, NIUA, New Delhi

The World Bank published the 31st World Development Report (WDR) 2009 with
the theme "Reshaping Economic Geography" in November 2008. The main message
of this year's report is economic growth will be unbalanced, but development
can still be inclusive. It argues that promoting transformations along the
three dimensions or 3D's of economic geography, namely Density, Distance,
and Division, are crucial to development and should be encouraged. The
Report challenges the assumption that economic activities must be spread
geographically to benefit the world's most poor and vulnerable. Geography
matters greatly in deciding what is needed, what is unnecessary, and what
will fail. The underlying theme of the Report is that economic growth will
be unbalanced but development can still be inclusive. The report provides
important inputs for understanding and developing an urban development
strategy, which may be pertinent to India.

The Ministry of Urban Development (MoUD) and the National Institute of Urban
Affairs (NIUA) organized a workshop cum seminar on the World Development
Report (WDR) 2009 at NIUA Seminar Room on the 12th of March 2009. Over 60
participants representing the World Bank, MoUD, Planning Commissions, Urban
Finance and Planning Organizations, a host of research and academic
institutes, international organizations, NGOs, etc., attended the workshop.
Presentations were given by Prof. Chetan Vaidya, Director, NIUA, Mr. A.K.
Mehta, Joint Secretary (Urban Development), MoUD, Mr. Justin Linn, Senior
Vice-President and Chief Economist, Dr. Indermit Gill, Director of the WDR
and Chief Economist, Europe and Central Asia and Mr. Somik V. Lall, World
Bank.

Mr. Justin Linn, brought out the need for economic concentration and
economic integration. He argued that the most effective policies for
promoting long-term growth are those that advocate transformations along the
dimensions of economic geography and economic integration both within and
across nations.

Dr. Gill, emphasized that integration should be the pivotal concept in the
policy discussions involving the location of production, people and
poverty-in particular, the debates on urbanization, regional development,
and globalization. Instead, all three overemphasize place-based
interventions.

Dr. Isher Judge Ahluwalia, Chairperson ICRIER and High Powered Expert
Committee (HPEC), initiated the discussion on the presentations. She
appreciated the analyses and the findings of the Report. She opined that it
has emphasized the need for maximizing agglomeration economies calibrated
according to the needs of different geographical scales. Other discussions
ranged around specific suggestions for India based on WDR, reconciliation of
district and metropolitan planning committee to the new 3D approach, need to
lock investment in infrastructure in the context of climate change
challenges.

Mr. Gill thanked all the participants for appreciating the Report and also
for raising various issues related to it. He said that the World Bank is
planning to come up with an India-specific WDR. He pointed out that India
has done a reasonably good job of political union, and now it should
urgently focus on economic union. He said that no country in the world had
economic development without urban development, and there cannot be urban
development without the commensurate proliferation of slums. He opined that
basic services should be provided to all, but economic infrastructure should
be concentrated in those regions that yield the highest rate of return. He
also said that incentives intended to attract industry to lagging areas
should be used sparingly.

Mr. Linn opined that countries should look to focus their attention to
ensure better-quality migration, by learning to optimize between
agglomeration benefits and congestion costs arising out of concentration
citing reference of China. He also emphasized that infrastructure investment
has to be linked to climate change challenges as well as technological
changes.

The workshop ended with a vote of thanks by Prof. Usha Raghupati, NIUA, to
all the participants
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