A big Green Opportunity: 600 Sustainable Cities in India

The semi-finals (Asia) of the Global Social Venture Fund was recently held at the Indian School of Business, Hyderabad. As part of the session, one panel discussion was on “Business Strategies for Inclusive Economic Growth”.

This discussion was moderated by my friend Dr. Reuben Abraham and the panelists were Dr. Atanu Dey (another good friend), Mr Varun Sahni of Acumen Fund, Mr K Krishan of Lalavalli Power Project, and Arjun Uppal of IFMR.

Atanu writes about his ideas relating to India’s economic growth on his blog.

First, he lays out the problem in Indian in relation to economic development.

You and I—and those who were gathered at the GSVC event—are exceptional. We live in cities, engage in non-agricultural work, and earn far more than what the average Indian earns. The vast majority of Indians live in villages, and eek out a meager existence from agricultural related labor. We tend to forget the fact that our economic prosperity and our lives in urban India are correlated. Therefore if the goal is India’s economic prosperity, somehow the 700 million living in some 600,000 villages of India have to have the same option of living and working in urban India on jobs in non-agricultural sectors.Economic growth is both a cause and consequence of urbanization. The reason is simple. Cities are the engines of growth. The high population and population densities of cities reduce “transaction costs.” Services are cheaper (as compared to the same in rural areas) because infrastructure is less costly because of scale economies. That is, infrastructure have high fixed costs and investment in infrastructure is lumpy. The high aggregate demand and supply of infrastructure in urban areas makes lower prices possible.

So the logic so far: economic development of India requires economic growth. Cities are engines of growth because there is a bi-directional link between urbanization and growth. Therefore the rural people have to be urbanized for India’s development and growth.

His main point is that India’s economic policy has focussed on the development of rural areas and not on rural people. That is a major insight. Once the problem is clear, then a solution can be presented.

In a second post, he provides the opportunities that large problems create.

Where there be challenges, there be opportunities. That is a mantra well-known to every entrepreneur. That immediately implies that India is truly the Land of Unlimited Opportunities.

It seems to me that the answer to rural development lies in urban development. Paradoxical but true.

Imagine building absolutely new cities from scratch for 600 million people. Imagine 600 new large cities of one million people each. Imagine building houses, schools, shopping centers, parks, factories, roads, public utilities, hospitals, libraries, . . . And now imagine doing that using the best urban planning known to humanity. Take whatever humanity knows about the best way to get things done, and use that to design and build cities that can develop and sustain the people for generations.

That is the greatest opportunity we have – of building from scratch – which is not available to any developed economy. Take for instance the US. US cities are the notoriously inefficient in terms of resource use and sustainability.

What we in India need is not so much hard resources as we need a bold compelling vision. We need the vision to look beyond the here and now, and see the future. If we have a bold, coherent, inspiring and realistic vision of the future, it will serve as the guide to purposeful action. I bet you are justifiably skeptical of my claim that we can work miracles. But I will argue in a future post how it can be done, and done with ease. Stay tuned.

Atanu is on to something this time. It pays to listen to what he has to say. Do read the entire post and the analogy in Telecommunications for understanding the leapfrogging concept.

(If you are interested or want to know more about Leapfrogging, check out the Leapfrog 101 by James Cascio and the leapfrog section at World Changing.)

One example of the leapfrogging solution is the work by William McDonough working with the Chinese government on building sustainable cities. It is called Dongton, located near Shanghai.

From Newsweek:

If McDonough’s method could be summed up in a phrase, it might be to leave nothing to chance. In each of the six cities, he is starting with a thorough examination of the land to be developed. He figures out how rainwater runs off and enters aquifers, how animals migrate, what plants grow where. He studies sunlight angles and wind patterns. Then he sketches in parks, which interconnect so citizens can walk or ride bicycles from one to the next and wildlife can carry on without disruption. Next comes the plan for the infrastructure, beginning with the angle of the streets. He slants them at a 15-degree angle to the winds in order to break up cold winter blasts and help keep city air clean. And orienting them on a diagonal rather than a rigid east-west grid also maximizes the sunlight that reaches apartments year-round. The cities are zoned for mixed residential, commercial and industrial use to ensure that transportation connects residences to the workplaces. Shops will be on the ground floor, residences above, and the rooftops will have farm plots. Bridges over the streets will connect the plots. The farmers will live downstairs.

Also, you can check out McDonough’s vision in 2 minute video at Big Picture TV. We will be tuned in for Atanu’s next installment.

Clearly, there is a great opportunity for building sustainable cities in India and China.