Challenges to Sustainable Transport in the Developing World Quazi Tausif Iqbal College of Architecture Art and Design American University of Sharjah q.tousif@gmail.com ABSTRACT
City planning agendas, in practice have been largely focused on better machine-concrete interaction. Our cities today are a nexus of contradicting visions led by the corporate sector, the government institutions and the grassroots sector. The capital power of the corporate sector has dominated most part of the twentieth century and still continues to retain upper hand well into the twenty first century. Despite this, the grassroots sector has been gaining significance and may become a force to reckon with in the distant future as the policy makers also realize the importance of sustainable growth. This paper is an attempt to understand the challenges faced by the developing countries in implementing sustainable transport policies, with a focus on above mentioned stakeholders, demonstrated using secondary sources. It is hoped that identifying these challenges will help stakeholders transform into facilitators of sustainability as a common societal goal. Keywords: sustainable transport, car manufacturers, policy makers, users, stakeholders, challenges 1.
INTRODUCTION
the natural environment.
Developing countries have experienced tremendous economic growth in the past few decades. This growth has brought with it technology and consuming power to the ever growing middle class. One such technology which has had a huge impact on the way cities function is the personal automobile. In fact any city which claims to be a favorable investment destination has to have a very strong transport infrastructure in place. However the quality of urban spaces and its natural environment has deteriorated over the past few years due to this new found fascination of developing world population – the personal automobile.
While the advancements in technology have considerably improved the quality of life, it is the ability of man or lack thereof in applying these responsibly and sustainably. Far from Patrick Geddes’s constructive intervention, cities have increasingly adopted drastic, not so well thought out interventions to the challenge of mobility in cities. It is becoming increasingly common to continuously expand the road infrastructure and in the process destroy the social fabric and more importantly the natural environment.
The second chapter provides a brief context and a criticism of land use and transport policies in most of the developing world cities today. The third chapter that follows discusses the 3 key stakeholders that this paper deems determinants of the state of transportation in cities – car manufacturers, policy makers, users. In conclusion, the friction between these various stakeholders and the way ahead is discussed.
James C. Scott in ‘Seeing like a State’ demonstrates the negative impacts of standardisation and examines the ill effects of implementing alien policies in a different political and geographical context. The standardisation of economic and land use policies through most of the developing world, largely borrowed from the west, replicates not only the economic development but also the challenges that come with it. The pollution and urban sprawl resulting from growing demand for road transport are an evidence that these policies are unsustainable
2.
THE VIOLENCE OF CITIES
Cities have evolved into complex organisms over the course of history. Civilizations, from the early ages, were a result of one very important aspect of human nature – to interact with fellow beings. After centuries of evolution and technological advancements, men have successfully decimated that very aspect of human agglomerations by allowing technology to take precedence over man and nature. Ironically, while early civilizations were formed to keep out natural threats and human invasions, cities today have become a threat from within - to themselves and to
2.1 Standardization
Considering that half of the world population lives in the developing countries, the increasing adoption rate of cars reinforces the self-destructive tendencies of a world addicted to personal automobile. In 2004, car usage in China and Africa had reached that of US in 1915 [1]. The demand for road transport is exploding. For example in 1950-51 the average distance travelled by an Indian was 285 km of which 185 km was by rail and 100 km by road. In 2000-01 average distance travelled was 3470 km – 449
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km by rail and 3021 km by road [2]. This shows the necessity to implement sustainable policies so as to cater to increasing demand for transportation. While doing so we can no longer afford to offset the ‘Environment Debt’ [3] incurred as a result of human activities. 3.
the demand for fuel efficiency by the middle class creates a competition to make cars fuel efficient, the automobile industry has largely remained stagnant for the last 100 years. There have not been any breakthroughs in sustainable forms of personal transport which could be ‘efficiently’ implemented on a larger scale.
THE THREE CHALLENGES
This paper attempts to examine three key role players in transportation planning – technological innovators, decision makers and the general public vis-à-vis car manufacturers, policy makers and the end users. These role players are deemed as challenges owing to their conflicting visions and the subsequent policies and actions. It is an amusing state of affairs where city planners try to reduce congestion and the manufacturers do the opposite by maximizing sales. It is therefore necessary to identify differences in order to devise means to achieve the common societal goal – a sustainable way of life.
A glance through the vision of most car companies reflect the sustainable ideas that have been incorporated into the values of the companies. However, given the mainstream buiseness models, these ideas seem more like a CSR exercise. What we get in the market is yet another sheep added to the herd with innovation that seems to offer nothing more than an extra inch of comfort to the users. It can no longer continue business as usual and the industry needs to play a cosntructive role not only in shaping the technology, but also in creating an awareness and educating the users.
3.1 Car Manufacturers
3.2 Policy Makers
The most influential of the three role players, the manufacturing industry has undoubtedly made a large contribution in the last century to fuel economic growth and improve the quality of life. The industry grew in the developing world during liberalization in the 90s in India and with the 8th Five Year Plan of 1991-95 in China [4]. The growth fuelled by joint ventures and partnerships allowed the U.S. and German manufacturers to enter developing countries and cater to the increasing middle class population. This also brought with it the business values of maximizing profits regardless of its impacts on the city and the environment.
Planning for transportation has always been reactive in developing world due to monetary constraints and the lack of a comprehensive vision. Over the years countries like China and India have adopted policies that encourage private car ownership. Due to lack of public transport infrastructure, the only viable alternative is to allow private transport to fill the gap.
The negative effects of the automobile on quality of spaces in the cities was established in the western world with the publication of Jane Jacobs’ ‘The Death and Life of Great American Cities’ and Donald Appleyards’ ‘Livable Streets’. However the developing world which was still struggling with the basic necessities and an increasing demand for goods and services were mesmerized with the new machine which was being sold as a dream and as a symbol of power and status in the society. The American Dream had become a universal dream. Much of the credit for consumerism seeping into the developing world goes to the marketing prowess of the automobile industry. Only if the hoarding on the road for the latest speed machine was accompanied by an unattractive obese man or a figure showing the number of lives lost due to road accidents or the environmental cost of the product. Amory Lovins et al show that barely 1% of the fuel in the car is used to actually move the human body [1]. Though
In fact many times policies proposed are counterproductive and strongly discourage any alternative mode of transport. For example in 2013, in a western Indian city of Kolkata, government implemented a ban on non-motorized transport on certain roads to ease congestion and speed up the traffic. It makes one wonder what thought, if any, may have gone in to ban a mode of transport which occupies barely 5-15% of the space that a standard car would require. With transport infrastructure becoming one of the most important factors in attracting investment, governments are increasingly playing a proactive role by developing comprehensive transport plans. Like any other planning issue, transportation planning has multiple dimensions. One of the aspects of the manufacturing industry is the employment generated as a result and the vast secondary and allied industries that rely on it. Amory Lovins et al in ‘Winning the Oil Endgame’ demonstrate how with well thought out policies and interventions America can get on the track to a sustainable future. The authors believe that USA, a country that consumes 25% of the world’s natural resources and which by 2025 would use as much oil as Canada, Western and Eastern Europe, Japan, Australia and New Zealand
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combined [1] can get oil independent by switching to more sustainable technology at no extra cost. In that case, with well though-out policies, there is certainly optimism for the rest of the world. Of the internal factors that influence transport policies are – lack of collaboration, lack of expertise, economic constraints, neglecting Land Use planning and the lack of an overall vision. Specifically important is the underplayed role of Land Use planning in the Transportation Planning. Sustainable transport solutions are not possible without sustainable land use planning. One of the external factors are lack of collaboration at a regional and international level. Despite having signed an impressive 500 treaties on various sustainability issues in the last 50 years, there has been little impact on the ground due to lack of will in implementing them from both the rich countries and the developing countries [6]. 3.3 The End User Perhaps the most vulnerable and the least powerful of three stakeholders discussed here and also the most important. Vulnerable because it is easy to misinform them and change their perception regarding an issue considering the economic power of the manufacturers and the political power of the policy makers. People all over the world believe car to be a symbol of achievement and speed is considered to be a natural human instinct. This can be attributed to the marketing prowess of the industry where people are continually bombarded with advertisements trying to sell their latest products. It is not uncommon to come across an individual who might glance at a car or a bike and call it his/her ‘dream machine’. Another perception among the general public is that automobile empowers and provides benefits when in fact real economic benefits of better transport services goes to the real estate sector [7] and the manufacturers. For the society, it destroys the social fabric by destroying public spaces and destroys natural environment. To demonstrate my next point, I quote Maxton et al [5] – “Of course, the car is something special:... But it also (sic) just a form of transport, a way to move from one place to another, as a bicycle or a bus. The danger is that consumers might begin to see through the Hype at some point and that they will see the car for what it really is: not just a safe little cocoon, our own little personal gravity challenged spaceship with a sound system, but a ubiquitous commodity which simply gets us around, and in the process pollutes the environment, uses up scarce resources in vastly inefficient ways and kills or maims hundreds of thousands of us each year [5].”
This statement reflects how an enlightened society is percieved as a threat to the automobile industry. Though it may not be reflective of the mainstream opinion, such perceptions in the discourse result in a contradiction of knowledge and values among various disciplines instilled in generation after generation . It is important that education in various disciplines takes into account all the various positive and negative aspects of technology. This difference in literature in various disciplines results in another generation which would differentiate between business/profitability and sustainability. The need of the hour is for every individual to think and act like an environmentalist. Therefore one of the biggest challenges is to empower and educate the public. There is an increasing interest and concern in the general public about sustainability. This may not be the situation in most developing countries where the issues and priorities are different. Although, the victims of policies that cater to automobile sector are more often the economically weaker sections of the society. One significant impact on the people’s life is in the form of quality of spaces in the city. The automobile completely destroys the public nature of the streets. In the absence of automobile, the street acts like an important element to promote social interaction among strangers and neighbors alike. In the developing world the expansion of roads takes place at the cost of public spaces due to congestion. The cost of foregoing important public spaces and losing the streets to the automobile is borne by the society at large. 4.
CONCLUSION
Each one of the three stakeholders form a nexus of contradicting ideas and contribute to the chaos that cities have become. Especially in the developing world there is a tendency to address sustainability as first world problem. There is a need to understand the irreversible impacts of certain policies and that damage to the environment can never be undone. There is increasing evidence from the rich countries such as the Hurricane Sandy in New York being considered a result of human activity [3] and therefore sooner or later one has to pay for the damage to the environment. 4.1 The Way Ahead Considering the differences among the stakeholders, it seems natural to provide a platform to promote collaboration among them in the public domain. Institutions that can bring together various stakeholders including government sector, private sector and NGOs need to be developed so as to promote collaboration and
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reduce conflicts in their policies and actions. As for the corporate sector, one important issue is lack of ‘accountability’. Externalities have been a contentious issue in the corporate sector. Rather than the polluter paying for the pollution, governments provide corporates with subsidies for establishing factories and assembly units in their territories in an attempt to generate employment and attract investment. Amy Larkin in her book ‘Environmental Debt’ stresses the need for accounting of the environmental damage caused by human intervention in economic terms. It is an important first step towards acknowledging a problem which is largely ignored or considered non-existent. She states that most corporates would be running in losses if the cost to environment is included to annual statement of profits. The most effective way to address the issue of sustainability is through awareness and empowerment of the people. The irony is that the key players who have the power to influence and create this awareness are the manufacturers and the governments. There is a need for an independent institution at all levels of governance which have equal power of not more in the policy making process and which deal solely with sustainability.
REFERENCES [1] A. B. Lovins, E. K. Datta, O.-E. Bustnes, J. G. Koomey and N. J. Glasgow, Winning the Oil Endgame, Rocky Mountain Institute, 2005.
[2] S. K. Singh, "Future mobility in India: Implications for energy," Transport Pollicy, no. 13, 2006.
[3] A. Larkin, Environmental Debt: The Hidden Costs of a Changing Global Economy, Palgrave Macmillan, 2013.
[4] E. Eckermann, World History of Automobile, Society of Autoomotive Engineers, 2001.
[5] G. P. Maxton and J. Wormald, Time for a Model Change: Reengineering the Global University Press, 2004.
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[6] J. Vidal, "Many treaties to save the earth, but where's the will to
implement them?," The Guardian, 7 June 2012. [Online]. Available: http://www.theguardian.com/environment/blog/2012/jun/07/earthtreaties-environmental-agreements. [Accessed 22 Decemeber 2013].
[7] K. Schaeffer and E. Sclar, "The limits of Economics," in Delivering Sustainable Transport, Pergamon, 2003, pp. 33-48.
It is very importance to understand the importance of local and vernacular solutions to problems facing the developing world. While exchange of knowledge and ideas in the globalizing world is inevitable, it is important to carefully adapt and innovate to cater to the local culture and environment. One way to offset the homogenization of policies is by involving the local population in the planning process [7]. Lastly and most importantly, the culture of consumerism is single biggest hindrance for any policy to work. An entire generation has been raised to believe that profits and money are what determine the worth of people regardless of the means used to achieve it. The desire for material goods results in the exploitation of natural environment. This indifference is a result of a lack of understanding of sustainable values at the core of the education system. Sustainable education, though has come a long way in the past decade, is largely an isolated discipline which results in contradicting values being embedded in different disciplines. To inculcate sustainability principles in the future generations, it is important that sustainability becomes the foundation of every discipline in academic institutions.
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