Page 9 - Connecting cities and communities with the Sustainable Development Goals

United for Smart Sustainable Cities
Connecting cities and communities with the Sustainable Development Goals

Introduction

The United for Smart Sustainable Cities (U4SSC) initiative is a distinctive global smart-city platform. This
unique initiative launched by the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) and United Nations Economic
Commission for Europe (UNECE) in May 2016, is supported by 16 United Nations agencies, programmes and
secretariats.
U4SSC has embraced the following definition for smart sustainable cities developed by ITU and UNECE:

“A smart sustainable city is an innovative city that uses information and communication technologies
(ICTs) and other means to improve quality of life, efficiency of urban operation and services and
competitiveness, while ensuring that it meets the needs of present and future generations with respect
to economic, social, environmental, as well as cultural, aspects.”

U4SSC has been facilitating knowledge sharing and partnership building on smart cities, with the aim of
formulating strategic guidelines to implement, among others, the New Urban Agenda, the Paris Agreement,
the Connect 2020 Agenda and the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
Within a short time frame, the initiative has grown by leaps and bounds and continues to receive
contributions to its work from across the globe.
Following the launch of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by the UN General Assembly in September
2015, countries have struggled to find a way to implement the SDGs at the national level. This report aims to
show that not only is the implementation of the SDGs possible, but that some countries and cities are already
making good progress in this domain.

The U4SSC members have prepared a series of case studies, output documents and products, which will
catapult successful smart-city measures into the global spotlight, for adoption.

This flipbook provides an overview of how cities can use information and communication technologies (ICTs)
to achieve the SDGs. It also maps the case studies to the various international agreements as well as the
SDGs. Based on the mapping in this flipbook, U4SSC aims to derive the best practices and guidelines with the
final goal of propelling transitions to smart cities while simultaneously achieving the SDGs. The outputs
presented in this flipbook are expected to provide urban stakeholders with an overview of innovative
concepts, policies and frameworks that have been adopted in various countries, to facilitate smart-city
transformations.

U4SSC series 3