Liveable Cities Philippines

From Plans to Outcomes: Building Resilient Cities in the Philippines

Submitted by manager on Mon, 12/15/2025 - 09:41

From Plans to Outcomes: Building Resilient Cities in the Philippines

Delivery Associates
2025

Last week, in partnership with Liveable Cities Philippines, we brought together hundreds of leaders across national and local government, philanthropy, private sector partners, and community organizations for a critical discussion: How can the Philippines move from plans to outcomes and build truly resilient cities?

Published on December 11, 2025

From Plans to Outcomes: Building Resilient Cities in the Philippines

Delivery Associates
2025

Last week, in partnership with Liveable Cities Philippines, we brought together hundreds of leaders across national and local government, philanthropy, private sector partners, and community organizations for a critical discussion: How can the Philippines move from plans to outcomes and build truly resilient cities?

The event, From Plans to Outcomes: Delivering Resilient Cities, convened voices from across sectors including Globe Telecom, ACEN Renewables, the Philippines Department of Education, and representatives from frontline communities including Borongan City. Speakers from across these organizations, alongside contributions from our very own Laurel Blatchford, Anna Needs, and Josh Wiseman, shared lessons from years of working on disaster preparedness, climate resilience, and delivery both globally and in the Philippines.

Held against the backdrop of rising climate volatility and increasingly frequent natural disasters, the mood in the room was one of urgency matched by a spirit of collective resolve. The spirit behind the Liveable Cities Labs, which have become a genuine community of practice, shined through. Leaders didn’t just come to learn, but problem-solved together in real time. The message that echoed was clear: the Philippines does not lack commitment, ideas, or ambition. What cities need now is the ability to implement reliably, collaboratively, and at scale.

Five Central Insights We Heard, and Why It Matters

1. Preparation and Planning Remain Essential

One universal truth was voiced throughout the event: you cannot control the crisis, but you can control how prepared you are for it.

Cities across the Philippines face risks from typhoons, earthquakes, flooding, and sea level rise. Yet even the most sophisticated hazard mapping is only as strong as the local plans, infrastructure, and coordination behind it.

We heard repeatedly that communities learn best from one another. As Laurel Blatchford noted, the most transformative resilience efforts are often built through peer-to-peer exchange—communities sharing what failed, what succeeded, and what they needed someone to tell them sooner.

Peer-to-peer learning – what worked, what didn’t, and what others should know sooner – is proving to be a powerful driver of resilience. Preparation is not an individual act. It is a collective practice.

2. Resilience Isn’t Only About the Crisis Response

In the Philippines, disaster response is a reality leaders live with constantly. But true resilience is not defined by the crisis. It is defined by how quickly and effectively systems can return to normal afterward. Across examples shared from New York City to work by the American Flood Coalition in Louisiana and Texas, one theme stood out: resilience requires strong institutions capable of continuing essential services such as schools, food systems, and transportation even under strain.

This means building internal government capacity, not just emergency protocols. It means improving coordination before the disaster hits, not after. And most importantly, it means creating structures that bring together agencies, local governments, and communities around shared risks and shared solutions.

In Borongan, leaders are leveraging innovative services to strengthen coordination before, during, and after disasters, helping reduce disruption and accelerate recovery.

3. Good Plans Focus on Outcomes, Not Just Programs

Having a plan is not the same as having a plan that delivers. We’ve seen this globally across our work.

After major shocks, governments often produce recovery strategies or long lists of projects, but without the capacity and routines to implement them, those plans risk gathering dust.

Experiences from Hurricane Sandy to the implementation of the Inflation Reduction Act showed that success depends on a dedicated delivery mechanism: a delivery unit, a dedicated team, or a system that drives coordination, sets priorities, and tracks progress over time with a focus on long term results.

For cities in the Philippines, these lessons resonate. Cities need not just good intentions, but delivery plans built around clear outcomes, supported by the right people, tools, and processes.

4. Partnering for Outcomes Is No Longer Optional

Throughout the event, one message kept resurfacing: no single institution can deliver resilience alone. Especially as climate financing gaps widen, we need to think differently about who’s involved in delivering outcomes.

Against this backdrop, three kinds of partnerships emerged as essential:

Philanthropy as a Catalyzer

In cities across the Philippines, philanthropic organizations have supported local governments to test new approaches in areas such as food systems, public health monitoring, and community-based planning—demonstrating how targeted support can accelerate practical, city-led solutions.

Financial Markets as Enablers
Cities cannot rely on public budgets alone. Tools such as catastrophe bonds, including emerging models that combine disaster response and adaptation financing, are beginning to reshape how governments prepare for climate shocks.

Civil Society and NGOs as Connectors
From Puerto Rico to the Philippines, NGOs play a vital role in supporting communities to rebuild in ways that are more equitable, sustainable, and resilient. They bring technical expertise, local trust, and the ability to connect community needs with government action, ensuring that recovery and resilience efforts reach those most affected.

Partnerships are not an accessory to resilience. They are its backbone.

5. Leadership for Resilience Must Outlast Any Crisis

Perhaps most importantly, resilience demands leadership willing to think beyond electoral cycles. Around the world, long-term sustainability and recovery efforts have shown that plans endure not because they are perfect, but because they are clear, compelling, and supported by clear ownership.

Across Philippine cities, there is a significant opportunity to strengthen this kind of long-term leadership to deliver for communities long after the immediate crisis has passed. The momentum and interest shown at the event highlighted just how much potential there is to deepen this approach.

We remain focused on supporting this opportunity: helping governments translate ambition into practical steps, strengthening the routines and capacity needed to deliver results, and ensuring that plans lead to real improvements for communities.

So Where Do We Go From Here?

The day closed with four practical reminders for any city serious about resilience:

Start with the outcomes that matter most. Let results, not just activities, drive coordination.
Engage the right partners early. Resilience is a whole of society endeavour.
Anchor in data and practice routines. Reliable delivery comes from grounding decisions in data and making habits that stick.
Build continuous learning into the system. Don’t wait for the next crisis to expose what needs fixing.

We left the event energized by what we saw: the Philippines begins from a position of strength, grounded in leadership, collaboration, and shared purpose.

What will matter now is not just the quality of plans, but the consistency of delivery. Sustained progress will depend on how effectively cities, partners, and communities work together to turn ambition into meaningful outcomes for the people they serve.

From risk to readiness

Submitted by manager on Mon, 12/15/2025 - 09:39

Disasters are becoming more frequent, complex, and costly. According to the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction’s (UNDRR) Global Assessment Report 2025, direct global disaster losses reached $202 billion in 2023, while indirect and cascading effects pushed the true annual cost to $2.3 trillion, highlighting that the full economic toll of disasters extends well beyond immediate physical damage.

Published on October 23, 2025

Disasters are becoming more frequent, complex, and costly. According to the United Nations Office for Disaster Risk Reduction’s (UNDRR) Global Assessment Report 2025, direct global disaster losses reached $202 billion in 2023, while indirect and cascading effects pushed the true annual cost to $2.3 trillion, highlighting that the full economic toll of disasters extends well beyond immediate physical damage.

Agriculture and property remain among the most vulnerable sectors. Food and Agriculture Organization’s global study has shown that historically, around 84 percent of drought-related economic losses are absorbed by the agriculture sector, a pattern that continues to underscore its extreme vulnerability today. Floods and storms cause widespread destruction to homes, infrastructure, and critical services. The consequences of these shocks extend across entire economies, weakening food security, disrupting supply chains, and eroding development gains that have taken decades to build.

In the Philippines, our agricultural sector suffered an estimated P57.8 billion in losses in 2024, primarily due to El Niño. We also incurred damage to infrastructure in the amount of P43 billion.

This year’s World Risk Index report highlights that disasters result from a combination of natural events or exposure and social vulnerability or lack of preparedness, aggravated by poverty and weak structures. The report focused on flood risk, a significant issue facing the Philippines in light of the current flood control scandal. Globally, floods are becoming more of a risk, exacerbated by climate change and human changes to natural land use and topography.

Recently, the Apec Business Advisory Council, together with the Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation (PDRF) and Liveable Cities, organized an online forum on disaster risk resilience, bringing together panelists from Chile, Taiwan, Indonesia, Turkey, and the Philippines to share lessons and practices on disaster preparedness.

Losses are not inevitable. The UNDRR has found that every $1 invested in disaster risk reduction can generate savings of up to $15 in response and recovery. Strengthening preparedness through early warning systems, climate-resilient infrastructure, and risk-informed planning has proven to significantly reduce both human and economic costs.

The savings in loss and damage are perhaps best illustrated by the experience of Taiwan. The 7.3-magnitude Jiji earthquake in 1999 killed over 2,400 people, injured 11,305, and destroyed or damaged 100,000 buildings. The following year, the government passed the Disaster Prevention and Protection Act, designated an annual National Disaster Prevention Day, and undertook a series of preventive and preparedness improvements. These included strengthening building codes and infrastructure resilience, retrofitting buildings, installing early warning systems and improving public preparedness, enhancing disaster management and response, strengthening community and international support, promoting continuous learning, and fostering public-private partnerships. Preparation paid off. When another 7.2-magnitude earthquake struck the same area in 2024, casualties were reduced to 18, injuries to 1,115 people, while severe damage was limited to 84 buildings.

Our online forum yielded 10 insights:
1. Disaster resilience is both a humanitarian and economic imperative. Preparedness saves lives and protects development gains.

2. Policy and practice must go together to address vulnerability. Policy alone will not solve the problem.

3. Preparedness pays dividends, as Taiwan’s experience above has shown.

4. Regional coordination multiplies the effectiveness of domestic response and systems, as in the case of Asean Coordinating Centre for Humanitarian Assistance on Disaster Management and the Pacific Alliance in Central America.

5. Financial innovation is central to closing the resilience funding gap, as demonstrated by the Pacific Alliance’s and the Philippines’ respective catastrophe bonds.

6. Private sector engagement is critical in building resilience, as illustrated by PDRF and the UN’s Connecting Business initiative.

7. The corporate sector has been moving from “donors to doers,” getting more hands-on involved in preparedness and response, aside from being donors.

8. Capacity building and knowledge transfer underpin sustainable resilience. More hands-on training strengthened institutional response.

9. Community engagement and “last mile” communications were important. Key messages needed to be understood by both policymakers and the general public down to village and household levels.

10. Strong governance anchored resilience efforts. It ensured accountability, coherence, and political commitment to transform policy into tangible practice on the ground.

These insights will hopefully help shape regional approaches and recommendations to ensure we can withstand shocks, protect vulnerable sectors, and maintain progress toward resilient and sustainable growth.

GUILLERMO M. LUZ
Chairman, Liveable Cities Philippines

Leadership and Liveability

Submitted by manager on Mon, 12/15/2025 - 09:25

Through our program, we have run almost 60 Liveable Cities Labs, each focusing on different aspects of city management and urban planning. Throughout the years, we’ve covered topics like public health, education, mass transit and mobility, infrastructure, flood control, disaster resilience, waste recycling, and a host of other topics of relevance to city mayors, LGU officials, residents, and the private sector. These hybrid sessions have attracted a following of about 60 onsite participants and 150-200 online participants.

Published on August 21, 2025

Through our program, we have run almost 60 Liveable Cities Labs, each focusing on different aspects of city management and urban planning. Throughout the years, we’ve covered topics like public health, education, mass transit and mobility, infrastructure, flood control, disaster resilience, waste recycling, and a host of other topics of relevance to city mayors, LGU officials, residents, and the private sector. These hybrid sessions have attracted a following of about 60 onsite participants and 150-200 online participants.

One of the most interesting labs that we have held was focused on governance, held last July. We assembled a panel of four speakers, all focused on their personal and professional perspectives on governance.

Our first panelist was Vice Mayor Ferdie Estrella of Baliwag City, Bulacan. Baliwag City is a model of good governance and a data-driven approach in action. It is one of the top-performing LGUs in the Philippines, but it didn’t start that way. When it was a municipality many years ago, it ranked around 950th in the Cities and Municipalities Competitiveness Index. Using data as the foundation for remaking itself into a competitive city, Baliwag focused on constant improvements and inched its way up the index until it ranked second for two consecutive years. To do this, the LGU banked on a reliable team for the consolidation and analysis of CMCI data to prepare strategic plans and trailblazing programs.

Our second panelist was Pia Ranada, head of community at Rappler, who brought her perspective as a journalist. Her approach was to promote inclusive governance and active citizen participation, and to keep a focus on liveable cities. This is journalism focused on liveability—making it a top-of-mind, newsworthy issue (e.g., waste management, transportation, disaster response).

This approach works well with Rappler’s biggest audiences, Millennials and Gen Z. Rappler wants to be a convenor of voices—a platform where different sectors meet to discuss reform. It then submits its citizen feedback to national agencies like Malacañang or the Department of Transportation. By encouraging the sharing of daily life issues, Rappler is promoting a dialogue for reform rather than just passive consumption of information and news. Playing its media role, the coverage of ordinances helps spread the word and gather public feedback.

Trust plays a key role in this equation. It enables participation while good governance drives liveability. Technology bridges gaps in governance and builds a strong digital foundation. The key outcomes of Tech in Trust are greater transparency, higher responsiveness rates, and stronger engagement with customers. To achieve this, Globe will build on three digital governance pillars: connectivity (the backbone of all digital efforts), agile and scalable cloud solutions, and cybersecurity to protect data and build public trust.

This is technology in governance in action.

Our third panelist was Dr. Jesus Estanislao, founder of the Institute for Solidarity Asia. He spoke of governance from a societal, cultural, and moral perspective. He emphasized that governance should be a culture, going beyond one-time transformation and becoming institutionalized and sustained. According to Estanislao, all good governance starts with values, and he emphasized four core national values: MakaDiyos (Godly), makatao (humane), makalikasan (environmentally conscious), and makabansa (nationalistic). These values must be cascaded through your family and staff. For instance, at city halls, they must reflect the values they promote: cleanliness, functionality, citizen dignity, courtesy, professionalism, quality service, teamwork and solidarity, and a shared responsibility for transformation.

This is governance that delivers, and it’s based on values and culture. These principles apply to both local and national governments.

Our fourth and final panelist was Mayor Benjamin Magalong of Baguio City. His challenge is that he has to govern an overpopulated city, facing uneven and unsustainable growth. Baguio’s success was masking deeper issues such as declining liveability and strained infrastructure.

His solution was to create a vision for Baguio by the year 2043 to make it a liveable, inclusive, and creative city. He invited city officials, barangays, civil society, and citizens to join in open consultations and digital participation in crafting the vision. More than a plan, he made it a shared commitment. The transformation is also data driven. Magalong is one of a few mayors who use artificial intelligence and data analytics to research and study his city. He has developed a “digital twin” of Baguio and installed community monitoring systems and a Liveability Index to guide planning.

This is consultation for governance in action.

So there you have it, governance in four perspectives. Leadership and liveability.

GUILLERMO M. LUZ
Chairman, Liveable Cities Philippines

Data and the City

Submitted by manager on Fri, 08/22/2025 - 15:47

Cities are basically the economic engines of national economies. Regardless of whether you are looking at developed or emerging countries, cities typically outperform their own host countries in terms of GDP, productivity, innovation, and creativity. Their growth outpaces the country they belong to. That should not really be so surprising since cities are the hubs of opportunity, innovation, and community.

Published on March 20, 2025

Cities are basically the economic engines of national economies. Regardless of whether you are looking at developed or emerging countries, cities typically outperform their own host countries in terms of GDP, productivity, innovation, and creativity. Their growth outpaces the country they belong to. That should not really be so surprising since cities are the hubs of opportunity, innovation, and community. They concentrate a large population in a relatively small space, which can create economies of scale and efficiency. When well planned, power and energy, communications, water, transportation, healthcare, education, and other basic services can be delivered efficiently and affordably. Density can be good, when well managed.

Cities also face complex challenges. Congestion, waste management, crime, poverty, poor housing, and traffic come to mind as among the problems which the modern metropolis faces. When poorly managed, urban density can become a living hell. Facing these complex challenges demand bold, forward-thinking, and creative solutions.

The management and solution to these challenges begins and ends with Data. Often overlooked, data is far more than numbers or statistics—it is the foundation of analysis and informed decision-making, the catalyst for innovation, and the key to unlocking the full potential of our cities. In an era of rapid urbanization and technological advancement, data has become a critical driver of progress. For Philippine cities, harnessing data effectively is essential to
boosting competitiveness, improving public services, and fostering sustainable growth. It allows us to identify challenges, optimize resources, and implement evidence-based solutions that deliver lasting impact.

Under our Liveable Cities project, we explore how cities can leverage data to unlock their potential. We examine initiatives that use data as a benchmarking tool, highlight its role in guiding decision-making, and showcase how it can help build a more competitive, sustainable, and liveable Philippines. We recently conducted a Liveable Cities Lab focused on Data and the City as part of this year’s theme “Sustain+Ability: Enabling Cities of the Future," which underscores our commitment to sustainability and equipping cities with the tools, knowledge, and partnerships needed to drive transformative change.

Why is it important to look at Cities? The country has almost 150 cities, which account for about 40 percent of the total population. On top of that, there are around 1,500 municipalities or towns which are classified as first or second-class, third or fourth-class, and fifth and sixth-class municipalities depending on their population and income. All told, the Philippines is over 50 percent urbanized. These cities and municipalities are scattered around the 7,000-plus islands across the country and collectively constitute the economic engines of the provinces and regions.

Once upon a time, it was difficult to collect and analyze data about our cities and municipalities. Mayors had no way of comparing their cities against other cities while entrepreneurs had difficulty making decisions where to locate their businesses. All that changed in 2012 when the then-National Competitiveness Council created the Cities and Municipalities Competitiveness Index or CMCI. This became a basic metric which city officials, businesses, and the academic community used to evaluate city and municipality performance.

CMCI started by measuring three basic performance indicators (Economy, Infrastructure, and Governance) and later added two indicators over the years (Resilience and Innovation). Starting with only 250 LGUs, CMCI now covers all 1,634 LGUs across the country. When it first started, LGUs could barely submit 50 percent of the required data. Today, they can submit up to 95 percent of the data requirement because they understand the value of Data to Mayors, Businessmen, and Academics. The data helps everybody assess the local competitiveness of our cities and municipalities.

Today, after running for over 12 years and collecting one of the most complete datasets for cities and municipalities, our Department of Trade and Industry wishes to discontinue the project for reasons still not clear to us. Discontinuing the CMCI cuts a fairly long time-series of data and runs the risk of ruining the practice of regular data collection and analysis which has already become a habit among LGUs. This is a practice which, I might add, requires constant improvement. It is important to continue, protect, and make this important database more transparent and accessible to the public and to city and municipal mayors. In the age of AI, we will need more clean and accurate datasets to use in models and algorithms which will be used to help analyze trends. CMCI’s cancellation in an age when data and data analytics is becoming more important is a step in the wrong direction.

GUILLERMO M. LUZ
Chairman, Liveable Cities Philippines

Urban Connect

Submitted by manager on Thu, 08/01/2024 - 14:28

We are pleased to announce that Liveable Cities Philippines will be joining the Urban Connect project. Urban Connect is a USAID project which focuses on urban development and management in nine cities across the Philippines: Batangas City, Iloilo, Tagbilaran (Bohol), Cagayan de Oro, Zamboanga City, General Santos City, Puerto Princesa, Legazpi City, and Tacloban.

Published on April 18, 2024

We are pleased to announce that Liveable Cities Philippines will be joining the Urban Connect project. Urban Connect is a USAID project which focuses on urban development and management in nine cities across the Philippines: Batangas City, Iloilo, Tagbilaran (Bohol), Cagayan de Oro, Zamboanga City, General Santos City, Puerto Princesa, Legazpi City, and Tacloban.

The project’s goal is to promote inclusive and resilient growth by enhancing local development and improving public service delivery. While it appears targeted at nine cities, in reality we are looking at their surrounding localities since these cities are like small metropolises whose impact stretch beyond their respective city limits. They are, in effect, growth hubs for their region or island.

The first key result area we are targeting is to boost local economic development by improving the regulatory environment for private investment and enterprise growth. This will require strengthening local government coordination across departments and agencies as well as better connectivity.

The second key result area is to improve public service delivery by strengthening public financial management, advancing e-government solutions, and enhancing delivery of basic services such as in health and education.

The third key result area is to strengthen climate resilience and disaster preparedness and promote greater gender equality and social inclusion.

Over the next 15 months, Liveable Cities will team up with the Urban Connect team to conduct urban management workshops and to run LocalLabs in the nine cities. The urban management workshops will basically assemble a group of government and private sector experts to work with city officials to focus on specific issues to address. Over the last several months, the Urban Connect team has travelled to all nine cities to scope out and list the priority issues which each city wanted to tackle. Liveable Cities, in turn, will work with experts from companies and organizations like Globe Telecom, Geodata, Public-Private Partnership Center, and other partners to take in-depth looks at each priority area.

The Liveable Cities team will also join hands with USAID, League of Cities of the Philippines, and Globe plus other partners to run its LocalLab series in each city. These Labs provide an opportunity for City Mayors and local chambers of commerce to trumpet what their city is all about and what investment opportunities lie ahead. It also provides us a chance to bring in technical experts to propose how they might provide solutions to specific issues in each city. These Labs will be managed in a hybrid format, with up to 100 persons in the live audience and a larger number tuning in on Zoom or Facebook.

We have run over 40 of these Labs, mostly in Metro Manila and focused on such themes as Public Health, Education, E-Commerce, Mobility and Transportation, Disaster Resilience, Infrastructure, Electric Vehicles, Public-Private Partnerships, GovTech, Intelligent Cities, Satellite Imaging, and other topics. Each Lab featured a panel of speakers which included City Mayors and private sector experts.

Among all these Labs, we’ve run two LocalLabs – for Batangas province and for Iloilo City. We have found that these LocalLabs have generated a great deal of interest and delivered different perspectives from our regular Labs. Thus, we’ve been happy to team up with Urban Connect to run a program through these nine cities. We have firmed up schedules for the first two cities – Zamboanga City for May 8 and Tagbilaran, Bohol for June 5. Other dates for cities will be announced all the way out to March 2025 as schedules are firmed up.

Let me close by highlighting an exciting development for cities and municipalities regardless of size. It’s a development which our Urban Connect cities should certainly look at. Artificial Intelligence will be a gamechanger for urban managers and city mayors. This is, of course, predicated on the ability to consistently collect quality data about a city. We know of at least two cities – Baguio City and Cauayan (Isabela) – who have used AI to analyze their city’s problems and to design solutions. In the case of Cauayan, the project was started by its previous Mayor, Bernard Dy and continued by his successor Mayor Caesar “Jaycee” Dy, Jr. In Baguio, their project was started by current Mayor, Benjamin Magalong. Both cities have worked with the Asian Institute of Management’s graduate school of data science and AI, headed by Professor Chris Monterola.

Both Cauayan and Baguio have already reaped some rewards from their early foray into AI. I woudld be surprised if more cities don’t jump into this opportunity in the next year.

GUILLERMO M. LUZ
Chairman, Liveable Cities Philippines
Chief Resilience Officer, Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation

What makes a city liveable?

Submitted by manager on Thu, 07/18/2024 - 14:30

What makes a city “liveable”? This is a question we’re often asked at the Liveable Cities project we run. Liveability can be a subjective matter for some – what you like about a particular city, for instance. However, there are actually some common standards which people use to evaluate whether a city is “liveable”.

Published on July 18, 2024

What makes a city “liveable”? This is a question we’re often asked at the Liveable Cities project we run. Liveability can be a subjective matter for some – what you like about a particular city, for instance. However, there are actually some common standards which people use to evaluate whether a city is “liveable”.

Two reports came out recently on city rankings on a global scale. The first was the Oxford Global Economics Global Cities Index 2024 and the second is the 2024 Global Liveability Index by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU), a sister organization to The Economist magazine. Both measure cities in a slightly different way but are instructive in what it tells us about what features or characteristics matter in cities.

We share the same view as what Oxford Economics and other organizations think about cities. “Cities are the driving force behind our global economy. They are the engines for national economic growth, centres for education and innovation, and seats of government power,” according to Oxford Economics.

Their report tracks the Top 1,000 cities in the world in terms of economics, human capital, quality of life, environment, and governance. These five categories measure the attractiveness of cities to residents and investors. These 1,000 cities represent 30 percent of the world’s population but 60 percent of global GDP. Interestingly, 70 percent of these cities outperformed their own countries in GDP and employment growth in the decade before COVID-19 struck. This trend was consistent across countries regardless of their income levels. Cities in rich and poor countries tended to outperform their own countries. Not surprisingly, they also had more educated populations and better access to basic services.

East Asia led the way with most cities in the Top 1,000 with 207, followed by Western Europe (141), South Asia (137), North America and Eastern Europe and Central Asia (107 each), South America (63), Middle East and North Africa (62), Central America and the Caribbean (46), and Oceania (12). The Philippines had 9 on the list.

The Top 10 on the list were New York (1), London (2), San Jose, California (3), Tokyo (4), Paris (5), Seattle (6), Los Angeles (7), San Francisco (8), Melbourne (9), and Zurich (10).

The nine cities for the Philippines were Manila (256), Cebu (436), Cagayan de Oro (487), Davao (500), Angeles (502), Bacolod (538), Dagupan (604), Zamboanga (695), and General Santos City (723). It’s not clear whether Manila referred to the city or to the entire Metro Manila.

The EIU’s world’s most liveable cities list for 2024 measures liveability in terms of such features as stability, healthcare, culture, environment, education, and infrastructure. Stability includes items like social unrest, crime and gun control laws, and conflict. Infrastructure includes measures on housing availability and prices. Basically, EIU’s index is a measurement of how comfortable it is to live in a city.

For the third consecutive year, Vienna has topped the list, followed by Copenhagen (2), Zurich (3), Melbourne (4), Calgary and Geneva (tied for 5th), Sydney and Vancouver (tied for 7th), and Osaka and Auckland (tied for 9th). Notably, London ranked 45th (versus 2nd on Oxford’s list, Los Angeles was 58th (7th on Oxford’s list), and New York came in at 70th (1st on Oxford’s list). A total of 173 cities appeared on the list. Metro Manila ranked 136th in the 2023 report.

For the Philippines, we can look at the Ambisyon Natin 2040 vision to give us some hints at what Filipinos might be looking for in cities – in fact, across our entire society in general and not limiting the wants to cities. Ambisyon was a 25-year aspirational plan launched in 2015 and designed to span four administrations for continuity in national planning. Among other things, it surveyed 20,000 Filipinos from all walks of life across the country to ask them what their aspirations and ambitions were for themselves and the country.

Among the features which Filipinos wanted for the future were affordable housing; good basic infrastructure and connectivity; access to education, tourism, leisure, and culture; and access to affordable health and wellness services. They also wanted to be safe and out of danger from distress and disasters. These are common denominators with international liveable cities indices. Mayors who focus on providing these and other factors such as those found in the Oxford and EIU lists would be doing a great service for their own residents and make their cities more attractive for investors as well.

GUILLERMO M. LUZ
Chairman, Liveable Cities Philippines
Chief Resilience Officer, Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation

Diagnosis

Submitted by manager on Wed, 02/21/2024 - 09:20

I recently had the opportunity to listen to a World Bank briefing on the “Philippines Systematic Country Diagnostic Update” during one of a series of consultative meetings done with various sectors. The main purpose of the report is to identify priorities for a country to most effectively and sustainably achieve its goal to end extreme poverty and boost shared prosperity on a liveable planet.

Published on February 15, 2024

I recently had the opportunity to listen to a World Bank briefing on the “Philippines Systematic Country Diagnostic Update” during one of a series of consultative meetings done with various sectors. The main purpose of the report is to identify priorities for a country to most effectively and sustainably achieve its goal to end extreme poverty and boost shared prosperity on a liveable planet.

For the decade 2010-2019, economic growth accelerated and became more inclusive, with poverty declining by 9.5 percent. Progress accelerated from 2015 to 2018 but the pandemic which hit in 2020 reversed some of those gains.

Inclusive growth and jobs. In this first thematic area, some of the challenges included a large infrastructure gap. In the 2023 edition of the Logistics Performance Index which measures the quality of a country’s infrastructure, the Philippines ranked 43rd out of 139 countries. We were behind Malaysia and Thailand, about the same as Vietnam, and ahead of Indonesia. We also had a big digital infrastructure gap and high electricity costs (double that of Indonesia and more than a third higher than Thailand’s).

We had low productivity and incomes in the agricultural sector, primarily due to fragmentation, lack of diversification and innovation, low mechanization, and weak infrastructure and supply chain linkages. Climate change and natural disasters coupled with uneven access to insurance and credit also hobbled this sector.

Lack of firms’ growth was a challenge for expansion of higher quality jobs. This was due to limited competition and lack of innovation. New technologies and artificial intelligence bring both promise and risks to these sectors.

Building human capital. In this second thematic area, the challenges are truly daunting. Certain aspects constrain income, productivity, and the job market. Low educational attainment and low learning outcomes are obvious barriers to entry to higher paying jobs. Moreover, the prevalence of malnutrition contributes to low learning outcomes. As of 2020, it was estimated that children could only expect to hit 52 percent of their potential productivity by age 18 because of low learning and health outcomes.

Low learning outcomes are the product of low quality education as well as the inability to complete school. About 37 percent of the workforce aged 25 and older have not completed high school and only 20 percent completed college.

Malnutrition is a major problem. As of 2021, about 28.8 percent of children below 5 years of age were stunted, one of the highest rates globally. Malnutrition, as everyone knows, has direct impact on learning outcomes.

Climate change and building resilience. Climate change is expected to have a significant impact on the country. Among its expected effects are reduced GDP, lower agricultural productivity (an estimated 9 percent to 21 percent drop by 2050), increased hunger (up 8 percent by 2030 and 13 percent by 2050), and overall erosion of our natural capital. Our defenses are not as prepared as they should be: from agricultural and food systems to cities and infrastructure (including power, water and sanitation, connectivity and telecommunications), biodiversity and ecological loss, and disaster risk financing and insurance, for instance.

Cross-cutting challenges. Cutting across these themes are three sets of challenges. The first has to do with local government service delivery. A combination of low local revenue generation, spotty intergovernmental fiscal transfers, overlapping service delivery responsibilities which lead to low accountability, and weak or uneven local capacities contribute to low execution.
The second challenge lies at the national government level. Inefficient public procurement, overlapping responsibilities among agencies, limited civil service capacity, and inconsistent decision-making over time are just some of the problems besetting this sector. Transparency, accountability, corruption, and concentration of political power also serve as additional issues.
The third cross-cutting issue is digital transformation. Not to belabor the obvious but by any measure—access, speed, and cost for both fixed and mobile broadband—the Philippines is a laggard in Asean. We are among the lowest in access and speed and highest in cost. The access gap between rich and poor widens and the spread of digital transformation in e-commerce, trade, digital payments, financial services and banking, and use of technology by small businesses lags in the region.

Better implementation is the key. The list of opportunities to treat these challenges is long. Some require policy changes but in most, if not all cases, require good implementation over a sustained period of time. However, implementation is the one thing we have not been able to do consistently well as a nation. What are we getting wrong and what can we do to fix these national challenges? The answer, I believe, lies in developing a new strategy for problem-solving and implementation. Today’s problems have grown far too large and critical for any single institution to solve. Given the Philippine context, we will need to devise better ways of harnessing public and private resources and skills to combat these problems.

GUILLERMO M. LUZ
Chairman, Liveable Cities Philippines
Chief Resilience Officer, Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation

The Future-Ready Liveable City

Submitted by manager on Wed, 01/24/2024 - 11:25

Just as the world is becoming increasingly urban – an estimated 75 percent of global population will live in cities by 2050 – so too is the Philippines. Out of an estimated 109 million people as of 2020, 45 million (or 41 percent) of them live in just 149 cities across the Philippines. The rest live in approximately 1,500 municipalities and rural areas.

Published on January 18, 2024

Just as the world is becoming increasingly urban – an estimated 75 percent of global population will live in cities by 2050 – so too is the Philippines. Out of an estimated 109 million people as of 2020, 45 million (or 41 percent) of them live in just 149 cities across the Philippines. The rest live in approximately 1,500 municipalities and rural areas.

By their sheer concentration of people, cities are faced with challenges on the social and infrastructure front such as public health delivery, transportation and traffic, poor infrastructure, delivery of basic goods and services, garbage collection, law enforcement, and even natural disasters are more acutely felt in cities and metropolitan areas.

At Liveable Cities, we believe that if properly designed and managed, cities and metropolitan areas can generate great benefits to people and nation in the form of economic development, productivity, and creativity. Cities are economic engines, contributing up to 80 percent of global GDP.

We’ve often been asked what makes a city Liveable and ready for the future. While smart cities typically have been cited as the wave of the future, upon deeper discussion with people we’ve learned that many other aspects come to mind to make a city Liveable and Future-Ready.

Through our Liveable Cities Labs, we aim to provide some greater focus on some of the following themes, in no particular order enumerated below. Our goal is to bring together Mayors, city planning officials, and experts together to discuss these themes in depth. Through this collaborative approach, we hope to support an exchange of ideas, best practices, and solutions for urban development.

Resilience: Navigating Natural Disasters and Building Stronger Communities. Though 2023 was a relatively mild year in terms of typhoons and storms – “only” 11 versus the usual 20 plus – you can count on climate change to cause disruption either in the form of typhoons, floods, or drought in different parts of the country. Moreover, the Philippines also faces risk from earthquakes and volcanic eruptions. One must remember that the country is ranked No. 1 – meaning riskiest – in the World Risk Index not because of exposure to natural hazards (many other countries do as well) but because we are least-prepared for it. Because of their large populations and density, cities will need to address the impact of natural disasters on urban areas and explore strategies to build resilience, minimize damage, and expedite the recovery process. Cities will need to undertake both climate mitigation and adaptation strategies.

Intelligent Cities and Connectivity as a Utility. Just as Electricity and Water are considered as utilities built into homes, buildings, and communities, so too should Connectivity and your Internet and WiFi. This is the first step towards building an Intelligent City. If there’s one positive thing which COVID brought is that it accelerated the growth of a digital, connected lifestyle. Work, dining, recreation, education, retail, and banking were all transformed from face-to-face interaction to virtual, digital transactions. There’s hardly any interaction that doesn’t have a digital interaction option, except for some government services which stubbornly remain analog and manual.

Developing a “connectivity as a utility” mindset and regulatory framework will only accelerate this trend. Imagine stepping into a newly-built building, apartment, or home and turning on and activating your WiFi by simply messaging your telco and not having to wait for an installation team to visit. If only Connectivity could work like Electricity and Water, pre-installed at the construction stage.

As that connectivity network is expanded, think of possibilities for Intelligent Cities; from Digital Permitting and E-Payments for City Hall and National Government transactions to better traffic management, law enforcement, disaster monitoring and response, air and water quality monitoring, and many other things which can be done with the help of technology.

Mobility: Navigating a Path to Sustainable Transportation Solutions. All major cities around the world face the challenge of mass transit and mobility. Many have solved or at least alleviated the pain of the daily commute. Philippine cities have not. Mass transit options are limited and road infrastructure is inadequate, leading to traffic jams and long commutes for residents. Metro Manila was just recently cited in one international report as having the worst traffic in the world for any metropolitan area. Motorists spent 117 hours stuck in traffic in 2023 in the national capital region.

Part of the problem lies in the inadequate mass transit system but another part seems to lie in the basic design of our cities. Fortunately, more cities are planning and building alternatives such as more pedestrian walkways and bicycle lanes. But real transformation might take place if we studied more closely the concept of the “15-minute city” where most facilities and transit access points such as bus stops are roughly 15 minutes away from any residence. It’s a tall order but something that would certainly make a big difference in large metropolitan areas.

These are just a few ideas of what might make a city more liveable. I’m sure that collaboration of city officials with professional urban planners and ordinary citizens from all walks of life will yield many more ideas of what can be improved in a city.

GUILLERMO M. LUZ
Chairman, Liveable Cities Philippines
Chief Resilience Officer, Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation

The need for intelligent cities, municipalities

Submitted by manager on Mon, 01/23/2023 - 17:29

Today, more than half of the world’s population live in cities. This proportion grew from just 30 percent in 1950 and is expected to reach around 66 percent by 2050. The same trend is true for the Philippines. Over half of our population lives in 1,634 cities and municipalities across the country, with a large proportion of them residing in 147 large cities.

Published on January 22, 2023

Today, more than half of the world’s population live in cities. This proportion grew from just 30 percent in 1950 and is expected to reach around 66 percent by 2050. The same trend is true for the Philippines. Over half of our population lives in 1,634 cities and municipalities across the country, with a large proportion of them residing in 147 large cities.

Cities account for a disproportionate contribution of the positives and negatives of the national balance sheet. The positives include contribution to GDP and productivity. The negatives include poverty, pollution, and environmental problems, and traffic, as examples. For better or for worse, cities will remain at the center of economic, social, and environmental activities and problems.

Effectively addressing these problems will not be easy. But with the increase of digital technologies and innovation, citizens and leaders can now easily address these issues in their localities. Insights gained from data can be used to plan development, guide timely investments, and manage assets, resources, and services efficiently. Likewise, with this explosion in digital technologies, citizens will have more access to information and can assess and expect more from their leaders.

For many cities, this may be the right time to embark on the journey to create an “intelligent city.” The needs are clear, the technology is available, and the means to deliver better services are within reach of many cities and municipalities now.

An intelligent city uses information and communications technology to improve a city’s operational efficiency, share information with the public, and improve quality of government services and citizen welfare. It helps create safe and sustainable environments centered around the well-being of residents. It should improve the overall quality of life and competitiveness, and meet the needs of the present and future of a city and its residents across economic, social, environmental, and cultural aspects. The key principle is that an intelligent city should be designed to address the needs of the citizens and residents.

Each city is, of course, quite different from another and will need to design its own version of an intelligent city. For instance, cities will have different “pain points” and will have their respective major problems they want to address. For some, it may be traffic or law enforcement. For others, it may be public health or disaster risk reduction. Because cities have different needs, there won’t be a “one size fits all” solution out there. But there will be many ideas and examples that can be shared among cities.

The concept of an intelligent city suggests that a lot of technology is required. Technology is not always the answer, but some technology will certainly be needed. The key is to design a solution around a clearly identified problem or issue, and then use technology to address it. There are many tools available such as mapping software, dashboards, cameras, and sensors already available, so cities should not have too much of a problem in procuring something. If anything, the challenge will be in picking the right things to use. Fortunately, cities can build intelligence modularly as opposed to installing a large, unwieldy project immediately.

Our Liveable Cities program this year will focus on helping build intelligent cities. We will do this through our regular Liveable Cities Labs, as well as Local Labs, which will take a deeper look at selected cities. We will also relaunch our Liveable Cities Challenge—a design competition to address urban challenges in mobility, resilience, ease of doing business, and public health—and close out the year with our Liveable Cities Summit.

If you’re interested in helping build more liveable cities which are competitive, sustainable, and resilient, please join us. I’m sure ordinary citizens will have many good ideas to contribute to make our cities more liveable.

GUILLERMO M. LUZ
Chairman, Liveable Cities Philippines
Chief Resilience Officer, Philippine Disaster Resilience Foundation

Liveable Cities Lab: Boosting Immunization through Technology and Innovation

Submitted by manager on Tue, 09/27/2022 - 11:57

Globally, there has been an alarming rise and reported outbreaks of flu, polio, measles, and dengue. According to WHO, vaccination currently averts 2 to 3 million deaths annually and could save 1.5 million more if global coverage of vaccinations improved. However, despite vaccination efforts, citizen reluctance, supply-side chain issues, and lack of communication are ongoing challenges faced by the healthcare sector.

Doctors and healthcare experts urge governments to prioritize community-wide immunization against vaccine-preventable diseases

Published on September 15, 2022

Globally, there has been an alarming rise and reported outbreaks of flu, polio, measles, and dengue. According to WHO, vaccination currently averts 2 to 3 million deaths annually and could save 1.5 million more if global coverage of vaccinations improved. However, despite vaccination efforts, citizen reluctance, supply-side chain issues, and lack of communication are ongoing challenges faced by the healthcare sector.

Liveable Cities Philippines, in partnership with Sanofi, recently organized another Special Health Lab, "Boosting Immunization through Technology and Innovation," with doctors and healthcare experts highlighting the importance of prioritizing community-wide vaccination in public health systems. The webinar was joined by Dr. Alfonso Miguel Regala of DOH Philippines, Dr. Anna Ong-Lim of UP-Philippine General Hospital, Dr. Rontgene Solante of San Lazaro Hospital, and health tech entrepreneur Ernest Troyss Pilapil of CareGo Philippines.

Dr. Rontgene Solante and other healthcare experts urged local government units to plan and create adult and childhood immunization programs in their public health agenda. “Vaccination must be a standard of care in the aging population since adult vaccinations prevent and reduce mortality, hospitalization, and death among adults,” said Dr. Solante, Chief of San Lazaro Hospital’s Adult Infectious Diseases Department.

On the other hand, Dr. Anna Ong-Lim of UP-PGH’s Pediatrics Department also discussed the importance of vaccinating children to eradicate life-threatening diseases such as polio, measles, and pneumonia. In 2020-2021 alone, DOH statistics showed higher rates of unvaccinated children compared to a fully-immunized cohort - almost a year of child population susceptible to vaccine-preventable diseases; consequently, making them a possible source of new outbreaks for both children and adults.

Dr. Alfonso Miguel Regala of DOH Philippines showed the economic, health, and social risks that individuals and communities will be exposed to when vaccination is not a priority, “Poor health outcomes will only lead to less productive systems. It is a result as well as a cost that is associated with our declining rates of vaccination. Immunization saves lives, prevents diseases, and reduces direct and indirect health costs.”

To achieve local immunity, Dr. Lim recommended the following medium to long-term solutions: improve the planning of vaccine requirements, expand to private sector delivery channels, allow more health cadres to provide routine vaccination, invest in cold and supply chains, and re-design procurement practices. Besides improving access to vaccines, proactive communication strategies and mass media campaigns must be implemented to address vaccine hesitancy. To boost immunization efforts, Troyss Pilapil introduced and founded health tech startup CareGo, an SMS-automated nudge system that sends vaccine reminders to individuals - delivering health service awareness to its constituents through effective engagement and communication of a city’s vaccination and healthcare program.

“Consistent and relentless efforts are required to ensure that people have access to the right information and make the right decisions. Simple technological solutions, such as CareGo, can help induce or change health-seeking behavior. In doing such, we all have a social responsibility and role to play in building healthier, liveable cities,” Sanofi Philippines’ Kashmira Prabhu concluded in her closing remarks.

This Liveable Cities Lab was made in partnership with the League of Cities of the Philippines and Globe Telecom with support from Sanofi Philippines.