101445

Local Action In A Globalizing Economy - Important Roles for Mayors and
City Administrations




by
James D. Wolfensohn
President
The World Bank Group

Via videoconference from Washington, DC, March 21, 2001

Mr. Chairman, Mr. Minister of State, and Mr. Mayor, ladies and gentlemen.
Let me say, first of all, how very happy I am to be with you today and to
say how sorry I am that it is my medium of a videoconference rather than
being with you personally, for, indeed, the subject that you're
addressing today is a subject that is very dear to my heart and very dear
to the hearts of many of my colleagues here in the World Bank Group.

As we look at the demographics of our world and as we look at the
concentration of people, it becomes very clear that increased emphasis
must be given to management and provision of services at a local level.
We are facing a population increase of 2 billion people over the next 25
years, moving us from 6 billion to 8 billion. We also know that in that
same period of time, 2 billion people will move to cities and towns.

This changes very significantly the way in which we as an international
development agency work, and it changes, of course, very significantly
the way in which democratic groups come together to manage themselves. No
longer is management done from some central government. It is distributed
through states and through cities and through towns. And we ourselves are
trying to adapt to the new conditions and to set up programs in which we
can be helpful to those city administrators who have this very heavy
responsibility.

I pay very great tribute to you in VNG who, for so many years, since
1912, have brought together the cities and towns in your own country to
share experiences and to build together the ways in which you can deliver
services in an effective way. We are very grateful to you and to your
government for the attention that you are giving to municipal
international cooperation so that we can work with you in years ahead to
try and strengthen the local units which deliver services to the
citizens.

We ourselves at the Bank have, as you know, a prime responsibility to
deal with central governments. Indeed, under our charter, we work
directly with central governments. But more and more, we're finding that
those central governments are ready and anxious to see us work with
states and with cities in terms of programs that we're engaged with.
We ourselves have set up a remarkable program, The Cities Alliance, in
which the Netherlands is a very active participant, in which we're
addressing such questions as Cities Without Slums, a program where over
the next 20 years we want to take 100 million slum dwellers and improve
their lives. We're also working on city development strategies in more
than 50 cities at this time, and we're seeking to achieve our objectives
not just by sharing our experience, but by setting up horizontal
connections of the type that you have pioneered in your own country.

Quite recently, I was in Monterrey, Mexico, where every Saturday morning
we are running courses for 1,500 mayors of cities and towns throughout
Latin America. We cover everything from preparing budgets to running the
fire department, to dealing with water issues, to dealing with sewage
issues. And the format is really very simple. A class is held, given by a
professor in Spanish, with materials prepared by the Bank and the
Monterrey Institute of Technology, and it is interactive through
interactive video, through downloading, through television sets, through
radio, and through Internet.

But the thing that is most important about this and which came through to
me when I met with a number of the mayors is not so much the teaching
itself, it is the coming together of a network of people who can
communicate with each other with their ideas and with their questions on
an ongoing basis. So someone midweek can be saying I'm having problems
with my police cars or with my ambulances or with collecting sewage, and
the next morning they've got 50, 60, or 100 answers from others
throughout the network telling them what it is that they would do in that
situation and offering help.

This rather simple idea is really expanding dramatically, and we have
come to learn that, certainly from the World Bank's point of view, we
have some experience, but the experience that is on the ground by
practitioners, by people who face these problems every day, is the base
element in building knowledge and in allowing people to develop their own
skills and applications of that knowledge.

It's for that reason that we are enormously excited about this particular
initiative, the coming together of the group that is within this church
to discuss how it is that an international expansion can take place. I
want you to know that, so far as the Bank is concerned, we are ready to
stand behind you in every way that we can to work with you to seek to
develop appropriate programs and an appropriate interchange of ideas and
experience that can benefit those in the developing world. We, of course,
are especially interested in the developing world because that is our
function. And we have 4.8 billion people out of the global population of
6 billion who are, if you like, our clients.

What is fascinating is that in the next 25 years this next 2 billion
people will go nearly entirely to the developing world. All but 50
million will, in fact, be added to the number that we have to service. So
in 25 years, we will have roughly 6.8 billion people out of a population
of 8 billion who will be part of the development communities. And,
clearly, within that group there will be major agglomerations of people
that will come to urban areas.
This challenge is a very serious one, but if we face it correctly, we can
make the cities a source of intellectual activity and vitality and
opportunity that can meet the needs of citizens. We have to keep the
cities open and well serviced. We have to give opportunity. We have to
give freedom of mobility and of trade. And we need to create the
supporting services that will allow people to flourish and allow their
children to grow with proper education and health.

These are all much more easily talked about than done. As we look at the
future, we look at 500 cities of a million people or more, and maybe as
many as 10,000 cities with 100,000 or more. These problems cannot be met
just by the Bank nor, indeed, by the managements of cities and towns on
their own. There is a need for all of us to go together and to learn
together. There is a need for lateral associations that can bring
together the experience of those who have had the experience to those who
are learning and seeking to develop.

We ourselves have a couple of new projects which we're testing: the
relationship between Hai Phong and Seattle and another between Montreal
and several West African cities. These initiatives are not something new.
You will have heard of twin cities very often in the past. But for us
they have a new focus, a focus that is geared to the issues of poverty
and to development, an issue that is geared to giving help and assistance
to those in development from those who have already seen the development
period and have emerged into fully functioning and effective local
governments.

This challenge that you're addressing today is not just another
mechanical challenge. It's not just another organization. I truly believe
that what you are doing can make a huge difference in terms of the
outlook for poverty in our world. And the outlook for poverty is really
the outlook for peace. If we don't address the issues of equity and
justice, we will have no peace in any of our cities, not in those in
Holland and not in those in the developing world.

So I join you in something that I regard as an exceedingly important
endeavor, one that can take your knowledge and experience and make it
available to those who need the knowledge and experience for development.

I thank you for allowing me to participate with you today, and I can
assure you that I and my colleagues at the World Bank will be always
ready to be of assistance and to work at your side.