Flood prevention marks MoU Human Cities Coalition with Malabon city, Manilla, the Philippines
Adequate drainage is one of issues in the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) that the Human Cities Coalition signed with the Malabon city government in Manilla, the Philippines on 29 June.
The signing marked the starting point – by identifying and developing innovative urbanization programmes – for improving the lives of locals living in slums of Malabon.
Signing of the MoU in Manila by honourable Antolin A. Oreta II (Mayor of Malabon) and Ronald Lenz (Director, HCC).
Flood prone
Malabon is part of the metropole of Manilla, the Philippines. It is a flat densely populated city, situated near the coast at the end of a large river. This makes it prone to flooding.
The city is currently in the middle of implementing a city development plan, which aims to sustain community development by focusing on poverty reduction, socioeconomic and environmental development, infrastructure development and disaster risk reduction.
Liveable megacities
The Human Cities Coalition is a new Dutch non-profit public-private partnership, initiated by a group of companies, that wants to make megacities in the emerging world more humane.
The MoU with Malabon City, marks the first official partnership by Human Cities Coalition with a local government.
Both parties agreed to address issues identified by the community, such as access to electricity, land and housing tenure, access to clean drinking water and adequate drainage.
Torrential rains regularly flood the streets in Malabon city, Manila, as here seen in August 2013.
Innovation workshop
During a two-day HCC innovation workshop, local companies, SMEs, financial experts, community members, and government representatives gathered and worked towards designing solutions for two issues: electricity and land tenure.
Given the noticeable thematic overlap, Malabon City stated it is proud to be HCC’s first official local government partner.
HCC selected two mega-cities to begin its work: Manila and Jakarta. Both cities suffer regularly from floods, caused by heavy rainfall.
Their impact is worsened by the fact that slum dwellers dump their waste in the waterways, causing obstructions and further flooding.
Many slum settlements are situated close to the water and are therefore most vulnerable to flooding.
About Human Cities Coalition
The Human Cities Coalition is a public-private partnership of organizations from business, government, NGOs and academia dedicated to making cities in the emerging world more inclusive and sustainable.
In particular for people living in slums, it aims to design inclusive processes to build sustainable urban infrastructure and business cases that meet the many planning challenges megacities face. And for which they are often unprepared.
This news item was originally published on the website of Human Cities Coalition.
Read also on this website
● FlexBase to realize floating platform for low-cost housing in Laguna Lake, Manila, Philippines, 5 October 2015
● VSO teaches Philippine communities to map flood risks with free online software, 10 November 2014
● Dutch experts assess flood risk reduction options for devastated Tacloban city, the Philippines, 16 July 2014
● Country: The Philippines
More information
Human Cities Coalition
Utrecht, the Netherlands
www.humancities.co
Video presentation on the envisioned partnership between government, communities and business to improving the lives of locals living in slums of Malabon.