The Ghana Institute of Planners (GIP) participated in the Ghana Urban Forum held under the theme: “Rapid Urban Growth in Ghana: Promoting Effective Urban Planning for Liveable and Sustainable Cities and Towns”. It was held under the auspices of the Ministry of Local Government, Decentralization and Rural Development and supported by partners including the World Bank and UNDP.
The event took place from 31st October-1st November 2022 at the Labadi Beach Hotel, Accra and brought together Government Ministries, Departments and Agencies, District Assemblies, Parastatals, Private Sector, Academia, Development Partners and Professional Bodies to deliberate on the theme.
GIP was represented by its President, Pln. Mohammed Alhassan Damba who delivered a paper on the topic: Recalibrating the Urban Morphology of Ghana for Effective Urban Policy Formulation and Implementation.
The paper emphasized the fact that at the core of any urban policy is the definition of what constitutes “urban”. It is argued in this paper that using the single criteria of 5000 as the threshold for a community to be described as urban has left a legacy of inefficient urban settlements. Using statistical data, I demonstrated how a combination of criteria such as population size, population density and functional complexity can get us to have urban settlements that have capacity to stimulate increased productivity, job creation, improved human capital and reduced poverty. It is also expected that such an enhanced definition of “urban” will help in proper targeting and precise measurement of urban policy interventions and facilitate international comparisons of urbanization in the most satisfactory manner.
Recommendations from this paper and similar ones delivered by the World Bank and Emeritus Prof. K.K. Adarkwa, (former Vice Chancellor of KNUST and Fellow of GIP) will be field tested and adopted for application as part of the revised Ghana Urban Policy.
