Cities, housing almost half of the world's population, are hubs for job creation, innovation, and growth. However, they grapple with challenges like concentration of poverty, pollution, and infrastructure bottlenecks. The scale and urgency of the current urban challenges highlight the potential of National Urban Policies in shaping cities that are more resilient, green, and inclusive as part of countries' recovery packages. National Urban Policy is a key instrument to achieve sustainable urban development in a shared responsibility across countries, regions, and cities. Policy coordination across sectors and all levels of government requires comprehensive national leadership to address cross-cutting urban challenges effectively. Urban policies must be seen through an "urban lens". The OECD Programme on National Urban Policy provides both country-specific and global support for developing National Urban Policies.
The OECD Principles on Urban Policy crystallise the experience of the Regional Development Policy Committee (RDPC) and its Working Party on Urban Policy into a one-stop shop international framework through which policy makers at all levels can share their own experiences of urban policy and governance and learn from international practices. Particularly, the fourth Principle highlights the importance of National Urban Policy in assessing and addressing the impact of globalisation, urbanisation, ageing, migration, population growth and decline, the production revolution, digitalisation, climate change, and other transformative trends on cities of all sizes. National Urban Policy is key to co-ordinating responsibilities and resources across levels of government to meet concomitantly place-specific needs, national objectives, and global commitments related to urban policy and sustainable development.
