Page 10 - Guide for smart and sustainable city leaders: Envisioning sustainable digital transformation

World Meteorological Organization

The accelerating growth of urban populations, especially in developing countries, has become
a driving force of human development. The most recent estimation is, that in less than 30 years
approximately 70% of the world population will live in urban areas. Crowded cities are centers
of creativity and economic progress but, from polluted air to flooding and other climate impacts,
they face major weather, climate, water and environment-related challenges. In addition, the
urban water demand is expected to increase by 80% over the next decades. This rise in demand
holds the potential to diminish resources and lead to overexploitation of water resources.
Increasingly dense, complex and interdependent urban systems leave cities vulnerable: through
a domino effect, a single extreme event can lead to a broad breakdown of a city’s infrastructure.
The World Meteorological Organization (WMO) is promoting safe, healthy and resilient cities
through the development of Urban Integrated Weather, Environment and Climate Services.
The aim is to build urban services that meet the special needs of cities through a combination
of dense observation networks, high-resolution weather forecasts, multi-hazard early warning
systems, disaster-management plans and climate services. This approach gives cities the tools
they need to reduce emissions, build thriving and resilient communities and implement the UN
Sustainable Development Goals (SDG).

WMO with its urban cross-cutting approach is involved in joint UN urban activities for
development of and implementation of the UN New Urban Agenda and SDG 11: “Make cities
inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable” with a number of external partners, e.g. UN-Habitat,
WHO, ITU, GEO, C40, ICLEI, International Association for Urban Climate (IAUC), etc. The IUS
methodology is integrated into broader Multi-Agency UN system U4SSC: United for Smart
Sustainable Cities, led by ITU, and its key performance indicators (KPIs) for smart sustainable
cities. In addition, just recently WMO’s Executive Council endorsed a new implementation
plan for advancing integrated climate and health science and services over the next ten years
relevant also for urban areas.

WMO also closely collaborated with ITU on the development of Module 8 on “Smart Water
Management” under the Toolkit on Digital Transformation for People-Oriented Cities and
Communities. Our joint experience for developing the Urban Integrated Systems and Services
demonstrates how important to involve local governments and city leaders into the processes
of developing the strategy and tools for building Smart and Sustainable Cities and Envisioning
their Sustainable Digital Transformation. Therefore, this Guide for Smart and Sustainable City
leaders: Envisioning Sustainable Digital Transformation is an important step to help city leaders
for their work on this important way to make our cities inclusive, safe, healthy, resilient and
sustainable.

Petteri Talaas
Secretary General
World Meteorological Organization

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