The Global Observatory linking Research to Action (GORA) Corp for the People Agenda has the mission to observe and connect research to actions for sustainable urban development, where human settlements are resilient, safe and inclusive. By linking research to action, GORA Corp makes people, researchers and policy makers join hands in formulation of policies that can promote people?s wellbeing. It creates an inclusive, participatory framework where the views of all stakeholders count. GORA Corp finally empowers people and institutions with an open data platform that helps to prioritize their needs in the global, national and local development agenda. It enables people to understand, visualize, analyze, and engage in sustainable urban development. GORA Corp has developed a model for ?Sustainable, Inclusive and Prosperous human settlements? that is relevant for countries of developing regions as well as of developed regions. GORA Corp's model holistically integrates Sustainability, Inclusion and Prosperity components, into the Sustainable, Inclusive and Prosperous Cities Index (SIPCI). A Sustainable, Inclusive & Prosperous Human Settlement promotes a people-centric approach based on three core components: Sustainable City Foundation, Social Inclusion, and Institutions & Laws. These three are the pillars of the other seven dimensions of the SIPCI: Infrastructure development, Environmental Sustainability, Economic development, Social development, Disasters exposure, Resilience, peace & security. The model is supported in four main programmes: Observatories ? Policy/Action Toolkits - Advocacy & Communication ? Training & Capacity Development.
The model has been introduced in India with a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) signed with the Indian Ministry of Urban Development. The MoU covers 100 cities within the 100 smart cities mission of the Prime Minister of India. The model is also being applied in Nigeria, where GORA Corp is working with Kogi and Ondo States to develop Observatories to monitor the states' performance in various sectors. A similar collaboration has also been initiated in Senegal, where GORA Corp has visited 17 communes from the region of Louga and is finalizing on MoUs with the communes to this effect At the international scene, GORA Corp is working with the European Commission on various projects employing remote sensing and geospatial analysis to monitor the spatial growth and changes in human settlement patterns over the past 40 years, and to predict future growth patterns. GORA Corp has also collaboratively launched the OpenCities Institute, which will play a key role in data collection, analysis and dissemination for planning, monitoring and evaluation of urban development, which will be key in monitoring the post 2015 development agenda.
GORA Corp has presented the SIPCI framework in various international conferences, including the second session of the Preparatory Committee of Habitat III, the 25th session of UN-Habitat's Governing Council, World Bank's land and shared prosperity conference, the World Statistics Congress among others, where the model has been identified as incorporating key tools for measuring development post 2015. Currently, GORA Corp is coordinating an international project on ?Smart Economy in Smart Cities? in four African cities: Cape Town, Dakar, Lagos & Nairobi. All these activities are directly relevant and connected to promoting the post 2015 development agenda.
GORA Corp is working with various UN bodies, national and local governments on projects at both the national and international levels. At the national level, GORA Corp is working with the government of India on the implementation of the Sustainable, Inclusive and Prosperous cities model in support of the government of India's 100 smart cities mission. In Nigeria, GORA Corp is working with the Kogi and Ondo State governments, in partnership with UN-Habitat to develop the two states' Observatory Linking Research to Action (ORA) programmes. The ORAs will act as tools for monitoring development in various sectors post 2015, and will provide various levels of data and information to the general public, researchers and policy makers both nationally and internationally through an open source platform. In Senegal, GORA Corp will be implementing similar programmes in the Louga region, where MoUs have been signed with the region's 17 communes.
At the international level, GORA Corp is a member of the Global Human Settlement Working Group of the Group on Earth Observations (GHS-WG), whose mandate is to develop, using remote sensing tools and technologies, a new generation of global settlement measurements and products to support national and global agendas including the UN Third Conference on Housing and Sustainable Urban Development (Habitat III, 2016) and the concurrent post-2015 processes on sustainable development, climate change and Hyogo framework for disaster risk reduction. The group, which draws membership from over 60 organizations, including the European Commission, the World Bank Group, the UNECE, the Earth Institute, university of Columbia, Yale university among others has already released preliminary findings on the Global Human Settlement Layer (GHSL), which will be a key tool for planning and monitoring urban development post 2015. GORA Corp is also a key member of the Global Land Tool Network's Global Land Indicators Initiative which is developing indicators to aid in measuring land tenure related aspects and their contribution to development of sustainable human settlements.
In the Africa region, GORA Corp is coordinating an international project titled ?Smart Economy in Smart Cities? in four African cities: Cape Town, Dakar, Lagos & Nairobi. The aim of the study is to understand how the various components forming the Sustainable, Inclusive and Prosperous Cities Index interact within each city, and how they contribute, or can contribute to smart economic growth, and in turn sustainable urban development.
In addition, GORA Corp has been shaping the "People's Agenda" through presentation of the SIPCI model at various international conferences. Of key relevance include the World Bank Land and Shared Prosperity conference, the World Statistics Congress, Urbanization in Europe conference, Emerging Trends in Sustainable Habitat and Integrated Cities conference in India among others.
yes - GoraCorpAnnualReportTechnicalPart2014-2015.pdf Gora Mboup: USA & Senegal
Robert Johnston: USA
Nefise Bazoglu: Turkey
Maharufa Hossain: Canada & Bangladesh
Ousmane Drame: Senegal
Cheikh Mbacke: Senegal
BYLAWS-GORA15August2014.pdf