GCRO certified as a member of UN-Habitat’s Global Urban Observatory

The Gauteng City-Region Observatory has been certified as a member of UN-Habitat’s Global Urban Observatory Network (GUO-Net). GUO-Net is a global information and capacity-building network of local, national, and regional urban observatories which is convened by UN-Habitat.

Certification of GCRO as member of GUO-Net.

Urban observatories around the world are responsible for a wide range of functions including data gathering and analysis; research and knowledge development; policy analysis; and capacity development to enable the growth and development of cities and regions consistent with the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

There are some 374 urban observatories that GUO-Net coordinates worldwide: 101 in Africa, 143 in Asia and 130 in Latin America. The GCRO joins urban observatories in all corners of the globe such as the Indian Institute for Human Settlements, Sierra Leone Urban Research Centre, Karachi Urban Lab, Laboratorio para la Ciudad, which all enjoy unique structures and mandates.

The stated purpose of GUO-Net is to support governments, local authorities and civil society:

• To improve the collection, management, analysis and use of information in formulating more effective urban policies;
• To improve information flows between all levels for better urban decision-making;
• To share information, knowledge and expertise using modern information and communication technology (ICT); and
• Conference of network members for information exchange and city-to-city networking.

Rashid Seedat, the Executive Director of the GCRO, has participated in recent GUO-Net convened discussions on the certification process and consultations on the establishment of a network steering committee. He said “this is a very exciting development for the GCRO. It confirms our place as a leading urban observatory and attests to our unique positioning between academia and government. It provides a platform for our internationalisation agenda and enables cross-pollination with other leading urban observatories across the world.”