Urbanization is an irreversible trend and an inevitable path towards global development, said Dr. Joan Clos, Executive Director of the UN Human Settlements Program (UN-Habitat), at a forum held on Monday in Guangzhou, China.

The forum also witnessed the release of Global Urban Competitiveness Report 2017-2018. According to what has been discussed at the forum, the urbanization process depends on the transformation of urban industries, during which value is to be gathered or distributed.

Dr. Clos also noted that to lift a city's competitiveness needs to balance such gathering or distribution of the city value, as well as national top-level planning, implementation of local areas, design in the midst of urbanization process, financial planning and ecological environment.

However, with the gathering of city value, there will arise the problems like population distribution, traffic jam. Dr. Clos advised that a balance between the gathering and distribution of city value should be sustained in order to promote a city's competitiveness.

Over the past decades, urbanization has changed the way cities are managed. And industries in China are also adapting themselves to global trends. For instance, service sectors of high and low added-value have undergone a series of reform and changes.

Dr. Clos, taking economic data of Guangzhou as an example, demonstrated that the tertiary industry has grown into a pillar industry there. The city is evolving into a service-driven economy, freeing itself from dependence on the primary and secondary industry. 

According to Dr. Clos, when a city's mainstay industry shifts from the primary industry to the secondary industry and further to the tertiary industry, its position is being enhanced gradually.

Email: gaohan@nbd.com.cn