VOI - Voice of Indonesia | RRI - Radio Republik Indonesia

LIPI Research Center held a webinar in commemoration of World Cities Day on Thursday. The webinar takes on the theme of City Transformation for Sustainable Development Goals.

Head of the LIPI Research Center, Herry Yogaswara, said that city transformation needs to be carried out by fully involving all components of society, including informal input.

He said city transformation is a fundamental change, involving more changes in the development framework.

"Therefore, the population approach needs to be an important aspect to consider," he said in the online webinar.

Herry said that the informal strategies that exist at the community level, which are developed by community groups especially vulnerable groups in urban areas, have not been integrated into urban planning which tends to be formal in nature.

"The right policies must be prepared to anticipate the increase in inequality that might occur," he said.

LIPI Population Research Center researcher Luh Kitty Katherina said that studies on urbanization, especially in developing countries, focused on the main cities of a country experiencing a very fast urbanization process, forming large urban areas or mega-urban, leaving other cities in the country.

"Apart from being a place of population concentration, these cities have a very high economic contribution to the national economy. However, nowadays, the urbanization map is starting to shift," Kitty said.

This shift shows that small and medium cities have an important role as a trigger and center that can attract people to come and live. They also have the potential to play an important role in balancing regional and rural development if they are well planned and managed.

"In Indonesia, the stretching development of medium-sized cities or often referred to as secondary cities began to appear around the 1970s," said Kitty.

A LIPI researcher, Galuh Syahbana Indraprahasta, explained that the development of information and communication technology is also crucial for urban areas.

"This fusion between technology and urban systems has created the Smart City label," she explained.

"There are several interesting lessons from the anecdotal cases of Smart City in Indonesia, namely people are more placed as users; greater opportunities for communities to participate in both the planning process and as Human Censorship; Efforts to involve the community require a process of socialization and learning that is not instantaneous," Galuh said.

The world organization United Nations (UN) named October 31 as World City Day as a collaborative effort between countries to address the challenges of urbanization and contribute to sustainable urban development around the world.

This year, World City Day takes the theme Valuing Our Communities and Cities so policies fairly respect the community and the city itself. (VOI)