Where did your interest in development begin and how has it led to where you are today?

I have been working in development for the past 20 years. Before that, I was a statistician and mathematician but my PhD supervisor who was a sociologist encouraged me to consider the social aspects in my demography research, not just the numbers. Since then I have sought to combine these two aspects in my career. Later, health also became central to my research.

After my PhD, my first job was to co-ordinate the west and central Africa programme of Demographic and Health Surveys, funded by USAid. My focus was on child immunisation, maternal and child health, HIV/Aids and family planning. In 2002 UN-Habitat was looking for an expert to examine slums and with the expertise I's built up by then, I was recommended for the post. I developed the methodology used to monitor target 7D – the Millennium Development Goals slum target. From there I was made chief of the Global Urban Observatory.

What is your vision for the Global Urban Observatory?

I have always said that if you produce information and it is not used for policy, or in any way that changes people's lives, then it is useless. Therefore our vision was to produce data that would inform policy and ultimately change lives for the better. For example, we have developed a new index which was launched in Naples in September 2012 at the World Urban Forum, and is called the City Prosperity Index (CPI). It states that the prosperity of cities should be measured not just by productivity, and takes into account infrastructure, quality of life, environment and equity.

We are seeing our vision being realised as there are now more than 200 cities that would like to apply the index.

What is innovative about this work?

It takes into account all the dimensions that looking at the 'slum' does not capture. The Human Development Index, developed by UNDP, is very good but doesn't take into account the specificity of cities; you will not find infrastructure, environment or equity there. With the CPI, we go beyond the slum and look at the city as a whole.

The CPI shows that we have moved beyond an economic definition of inequality. For instance, we are also looking at access to public services because there are cities where the poor do not have access to public spaces. This approach will move us past the traditional urban planning that separates the rich from the poor and towards what we call inclusive urban planning.

What makes a good development leader?

It is important to make the distinction between leadership and management. A leader must have vision. It is someone who should see beyond today. They should be able to anticipate, plan, guide and convince people because sometimes it is not easy to wield influence – even if you have good ideas. I think a good leader should have a vision but should also know how to communicate that vision, but they should also listen.

The most important leadership quality is trust. If people do not trust you, they will not give importance to what you are saying. You must firstly build trust between you and your partners. Secondly, leaders must demonstrate that they have a common interest with their team. If people think you have only your own agenda, they will not follow. These skills are key to being a good development leader.

Who is your development hero?

Wangari Maathai, who has unfortunately now passed away. She won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2004 because she fought for the environment and fought until the end of her life. If it was not for her, Kenya would not have green public space and forest. Thanks to her Nairobi, the capital, is a green city. Her work however extends beyond Kenya – it was for Africa and the world in general.

What I learnt from Wangari was the importance of perseverance. From her you learn that if you believe in something, stick with it.

What other lessons have you learnt through your career?

I have learnt a lot from working with UN-Habitat. The international development agenda is very complex because you are dealing with countries and cities, which all have different levels of development and different needs. This makes finding a common agenda very difficult. Every sentence has political implications and I quickly learnt that to negotiation is to give and take. Without compromise, there is no negotiation. One of the best lessons I have learnt is to make the distinction between my personal and institutional position.

In terms of more general lessons, sometimes we think we can predict our future, but there are many unplanned, circumstantial happenings, so we have always to be a little bit humble.

What is the future of development?

The future of development depends on us. We have to learn from the past and take the necessary measures for the future. Inequity and inclusion were not adequately factored in the MDGs, but we now know that to build a sustainable society you need to have an equitable distribution of resources, and we should include all groups. We also have to deal with another very important problem – conflict. You cannot create a stable nation where there is conflict, therefore the challenge is how to mitigate conflict. Equity and mitigating conflict, for me, are key.

In terms of what we are doing at the Global Urban Observatory, we are preparing information on key urban issues for the Habitat III conference in 2016, where we'll discuss the Habitat agenda for the next 20 years. We don't yet know what exactly this will look like but certainly housing, urban planning and cities themselves will be up for consideration. More and more, cities are being seen as central to the development agenda.

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