Urban Development

The World Bank Land Conference is a leading global event for the land sector, bringing together stakeholders from multiple sectors to discuss research, policy, and best practices. Over the years, it has facilitated cross-sectoral knowledge exchange and helped incubate important initiatives such as the Voluntary Guidelines and the Land Governance Assessment Framework. The 2025 conference will take place in Washington, DC from May 5–8, and invites submissions for Expression of Interest (EOI) and proposals.

The Tokyo Development Learning Center (TDLC) is a World Bank initiative in partnership with the Government of Japan, aimed at enhancing urban development globally. Through its Technical Deep Dive (TDD) workshops, TDLC brings together participants from developing countries and World Bank teams to create actionable solutions for urban development. These workshops incorporate insights from Japanese and global experiences, including expert presentations and site visits.

This course addresses the growing challenge of solid waste management and its impact on the environment and public health. It encourages participants to reflect on the increasing amounts of waste generated globally and the often-overlooked consequences of disposal. Through this training, learners will explore the lifecycle of waste, from collection to its long-term effects on communities and ecosystems.

This course is based on the World Bank’s Smart Cities for Sustainable Development and explores how smart cities leverage data and technology for sustainability. It is structured around four key themes: Green, Smart, Development, and Vision. Over four weeks, participants will examine case studies and innovative approaches that make cities more efficient, inclusive, and resilient.

This course addresses the challenges faced by the global urban population living in slums, particularly in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. It equips policymakers and urban practitioners with the knowledge to design, implement, and sustain effective slum upgrading interventions. Participants will explore key policy and programmatic approaches for scaling up urban upgrading and planning for future growth.

This course explores three IFC-financed projects—a wastewater treatment plant, a solid waste treatment project, and a public transportation upgrade. Through interactive decision points, participants will learn how municipalities can address environmental and social (E&S) challenges. The course provides practical insights into mitigating E&S risks throughout the investment lifecycle.

The Global Platform for Sustainable Cities (GPSC) is a World Bank initiative that connects cities and partners to address urbanization and climate change challenges. The Regional City Academy, a core GPSC program, provides practical training to city leaders and urban practitioners to manage sustainable urban development through expert knowledge, tools, and best practices. The upcoming Regional City Academy in Guangzhou will focus on low-carbon, resilient growth for Asian cities, highlighting Guangzhou’s innovative urban practices like green infrastructure and flood management.

This course explores the financing challenges faced by cities worldwide, from bankruptcy to declining infrastructure and urban poverty. It examines the growing complexity of municipal governance, where officials must address urgent issues like social inclusion, economic development, crime, climate change, and natural disasters. Through this exploration, the course highlights both the urgency and opportunity for transformative change in urban management.

The City Creditworthiness Self-Assessment & Planning Toolkit (City Cred Tool) enables local authorities to assess core challenges in creditworthy financial management and create action plans to address them. It is designed for municipalities, regional governments, and special purpose entities, such as service operating companies and municipal banks, that manage essential public services. By using this toolkit, local authorities can identify key financial weaknesses and implement strategies to improve their financial management practices.

This forum convenes a dynamic global community of experts, practitioners, and stakeholders focused on advancing disaster risk identification, assessment, and communication. Held biennially, the most recent event in Himeji, Japan, attracted 1,700 participants from 135 countries and over 700 organizations. The forum serves as an ongoing network that fosters collaboration, knowledge exchange, and innovation to drive actionable solutions for enhancing resilience and mitigation efforts.

This program organizes a series of capacity-building workshops focused on resilience planning, where participating cities gain technical expertise to prioritize and design resilience-enhancing investments based on World Bank Group (WBG) operations. A key component of the workshops is hands-on training with the City Scan, a tool that combines spatial and socio-economic data to help decision-makers engage in discussions about natural hazards and disaster risks. Through these workshops, cities develop coordinated strategies to address risks in key sectors and areas that require targeted investments.

The Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) team organizes various capacity-building activities, such as workshops, technical deep dives, and training sessions. A key highlight of these activities is the technical deep dive, which consists of week-long immersive study tours focused on examining NBS approaches in a specific country. These study tours bring together project teams, including representatives from both partner countries and development partners, to learn and collaborate on NBS strategies

The Emergency Preparedness & Response (EP&R) team organizes a series of sessions focused on lessons learned exercises, where frontline practitioners collaborate to reflect on and share insights from their response to recent emergencies. These sessions aim to identify key lessons and inform actionable steps for improving future disaster risk management (DRM) capabilities. Through this collaborative reflection, the sessions drive concrete actions to enhance preparedness and response strategies.

This course explores the vulnerability of school buildings to earthquakes and tropical cyclones, as highlighted by the Global Baseline of School Infrastructure. It focuses on the World Bank’s two flagship tools, the Roadmap for Safer and Resilient Schools (RSRS) and the Global Library of School Infrastructure (GLOSI), designed to help build a more resilient school system. Participants will gain key insights into how to apply and implement the RSRS to improve school infrastructure resilience through effective intervention strategies and investment.