The United for Smart Sustainable Cities (U4SSC) collaborative initiative has provided new expert guidance for the transition to more efficient, sustainable urban environments –in the form of four new reports. Sixteen United Nations bodies contributed to the development of the reports, a process coordinated by ITU and the UN Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE).

In focus are key performance indicators (KPIs) for smart sustainable cities that support achievement of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). Case studies shed light on cities’ experiences with e-governance initiatives, sustainability projects and smart-city financing models. An analysis of the role played by public policy in promoting smart cities elaborates the connection between policy innovation and smart urban planning.

The U4SSC initiative advocates for public policy to ensure that information and communication technologies (ICTs), and ICT standards in particular, play a definitive role in the transition to smart sustainable cities.

“This innovative U4SSC initiative is encouraging critical dialogue between policy and technical communities,” said ITU Secretary-General Houlin Zhao. “This is already resulting in valuable awareness raising of the importance of international standards to the coherent application of ICTs in smart cities, among other key guidance.”

“The transition to smart sustainable cities will demand effective public-private collaboration and ITU is taking proactive measures to build common understanding between city leaders and ICT standards developers,” said Nasser Almarzouqi of the Telecommunication Regulatory Authority of the United Arab Emirates, the Co-Chair of the U4SSC initiative and Chairman of the ITU standardization expert group for ‘Internet of Things and Smart Cities and Communities’, ITU-T Study Group 20.

“The collaboration hosted by the U4SSC initiative has led to over 50 cities, including Manizales, Valencia, Pully and many others, joining the pilot project and implementing U4SSC’s key performance indicators for smart sustainable cities. We encourage more cities to implement these KPIs and participate in the work of the U4SSC initiative,” said U4SSC Co-Chair Gloria Placer Maruri of Spain’s Ministry for the Digital Agenda.

The four reports are informed by a wide variety of cities’ experiences in promoting smart city innovation.

‘Collection methodology for the Key Performance Indicators for Smart Sustainable Cities’ provides cities with a methodology to collect core data and information necessary to the assessment of their progress in implementing smart city strategies.

The collection methodology developed by U4SSC complements the three sets of KPIs for smart sustainable cities developed by ITU and UNECE. Two sets of indicators provide a framework to measure and report progress relevant to the ICT aspects of a smart city, in terms of the use of ICTs and the impact of ICTs on sustainability. The third assists cities’ efforts to measure their progress towards the achievement of the SDGs.

‘Connecting cities and communities with the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)’ maps 17 case studies of smart city projects to the 17 ambitions of the SDGs.

‘Enhancing innovation and participation in smart sustainable cities’ provides case studies of e-governance initiatives, sustainability projects and smart-city financing models, reporting on the experiences of cities including Dubai, Singapore and Seoul.

‘Implementing SDG11 by connecting sustainability policies and urban planning practices through ICTs’ assesses the impact of innovative public policy on urban planning, particularly in relation to the status afforded to ICTs by urban planning activities.

The UN Agencies, Programmes and Secretariats supporting the U4SSC initiative are:

• Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD)
• Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC)
• Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)
• International Telecommunication Union (ITU)
• Regional Bureau for Sciences in Latin America and the Caribbean of the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO)
• United Nations Development Programme (UNDP)
• United Nations Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA)
• United Nations Economic Commission for Europe (UNECE)
• United Nations Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women (UN-Women)
• United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP)
• United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative (UNEP-FI)
• United Nations Framework Convention for Climate Change (UNFCCC)
• United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat)
• United Nations Industrial Development Organization (UNIDO)
• United Nations University – Operating Unit on Policy-Driven Electronic Governance (UNU-EGOV)
• World Meteorological Organization (WMO)

For more information about the United for Smart Sustainable Cities, visit here: https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-T/ssc/united/Pages/default.aspx