Like Asian ‘dragons’, African economies have achieved breakthrough growth in the past years, thus expected to become the fastest-growing region in the world in the next five years. However, economic growth also entails rapid but problematic urbanisation. Widely known for its effective use of official development assistance (ODA) capital in urban development, Vietnam is seen as a good example for African countries to learn, particularly urban planning and construction.
Deputy Construction Minister Nguyen Thanh Nghi said Vietnam attained important results in urban development, urban management and technical infrastructure in Vietnam. The country has 756 cities, with Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City being the biggest. Urban architecture and landscape, living environment and conditions of urban citizens are improved. Technical infrastructure is upgraded. These successes have created cleaner, greener and nicer urban zones. To date, the urbanisation rate has reached 31 percent and Vietnam is striving for 45 percent in the next 10 years. Apart from its achievements, Vietnam’s urban zones are also exposing a lot of limitations like rapid expansion, lack control, low coverage rate, technical and social infrastructure imbalance, etc.
Like Vietnam, African countries are facing with many aching problems in urban development. Ms Marie NDAW, Technical Director of Senegal Urban Development Agency, said: Urban population is expanding rapidly in urban zones but governments have not applied urban planning and regulations. Thus, they affect space organisation, internal and external development imbalance, divided urban networks, insufficient housing, traffic congestion, environment, flooding and social security. Institutional instability in Africa has affected the efficiency of urban development policies and development partners in bilateral and multilateral cooperation framework. For example, in Senegal, in 2011, the Ministry of Urban Development changed organisational structure and management agency five times. Or, Collective economic development and infrastructure are not commensurate with networks and demand of urban residents.
These problems are the common concerns of African nations which are seeking solutions to solve. Given similar challenges and difficulties, Vietnam’s experience in this effect will be extremely useful for the future development of Africa countries.
Currently, both Vietnam and Africa are receiving aid for urban construction and development from Japan. A representative of Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) - a third party that assists Vietnam and Africa, noted that Vietnam can serve as an example for African countries in the first stage of urbanisation although it is not excellent at urban planning and development.
Mr Samba Diouf, Head of African Delegation, said Vietnam is a mirror for African countries to study the traditional form called 2+1 in the South - South cooperation framework, in which Vietnam helps Africa with personnel support through the financial support of Japan. He added that cultures, customs and socioeconomic conditions of African nations are different; the continent cannot fully apply Vietnam’s experience to specific nations. However, this black continent will try to learn and refine appropriate lessons and useful experience and have good initiatives and solutions for better urban development and management, higher urban quality and better living quality for urban residents.
Thanh Tan
Vietnamese
