This OECD National Urban Policy Review of Colombia provides a comprehensive assessment of the country’s national urban policy ‘the System of Cities’ and of different sectoral policies that affect urban life: transport, housing, land use, and digitalisation. Colombia has entered the 2020s facing five intertwined crises: the COVID-19 pandemic, rising levels of poverty and inequality, a wave of mass international migration, the peace process consolidation, and the climate emergency.

This OECD National Urban Policy Review of Colombia provides a comprehensive assessment of the country's national urban policy 'the System of Cities' and of different sectoral policies that affect urban life: transport, housing, land use, and digitalisation. Colombia has entered the 2020s facing five intertwined crises: the COVID-19 pandemic, rising levels of poverty and inequality, a wave of mass international migration, the peace process consolidation, and the climate emergency. As the country seeks an answer to all those challenges, Colombia's social and economic prosperity and environmental sustainability will be more tightly linked to the functioning of its cities and its urban governance system. This OECD review makes the case for an integrated, placed-based and inclusive urban development model and urban agenda that seize immediate opportunities that arise in fiscal, economic and sectorial policies, and protect hard-won gains from years of experience of urban policy implementation in the country. Designing a new national urban policy for Colombia - Ciudades 4.0 - demands a critical rethinking of whether urban areas are meeting the needs of all Colombians, and how different urban-related policies could help transform them for the better.

Cities are not only home to around half of the global population but also major centers of economic activity and innovation. Yet, so far there has been no consensus of what a city really is. Substantial differences in the way cities, metropolitan, urban, and rural areas are defined across countries hinder robust international comparisons and an accurate monitoring of SDGs. The report Cities in the World: A New Perspective on Urbanisation addresses this void and provides new insights on urbanisation by applying for the first time two new definitions of human settlements to the entire globe: the Degree of Urbanisation and the Functional Urban Area.

Rural regions in Colombia have untapped potential to boost wealth and well-being in the country. Despite remarkable economic growth over the last two decades, Colombia’s development policy needs to increase its focus on rurality, as regional inequalities remain high by OECD standards and structural challenges still prevent greater development in rural places.

This report examines the economic and socio-economic trends in Chile’s urban areas; it analyses four policy areas with significant implications for national urban programming, and it examines possible approaches for revitalising the urban governance.

This report is thus intended as “food for thought” for national, sub-national and municipal governments as they seek to address their economic and environmental challenges through the development and implementation of spatial strategies in pursuit of Green Growth objectives.

This report provides a comprehensive assessment of Kazakhstan’s urban policies in terms of economic, social and environmental impact.