New ARCADIS Sustainable Cities Index ranks of 50 of the world’s leading cities across the demands of People, Planet and Profit.
European cities have emerged as the global leaders in sustainable development according to the latest ranking and analysis by ARCADIS.
Frankfurt tops the list of world cities for its impact on people, the planet and profitability followed closely by London, Copenhagen, Amsterdam, Rotterdam and Berlin.
"Sustainability could prove more sensitive to changing economic circumstances or shifts in environmental policy."
Asian cities Seoul, Hong Kong and Singapore also made the top ten overall with Seoul ranked second in terms of impact on people and Hong Kong ranked third on profitability.
However, at the other end of the scale, Manila, Mumbai, Wuhan and New Delhi propped up the 50-strong list taking four of the bottom five cites.
The ranking shows no North American city in the top ten. Toronto is the highest ranked at 12th, Boston (15th) and Chicago (19th) in terms of the most sustainable cities in the US.
The ARCADIS report breaks sustainability performance into three sub-categories in an attempt to better understand the drivers for sustainable growth:
The report highlights that sustainability of many global cities on the index appears to be unbalanced across the three indices.
“Doha, for example scores much higher on the Profit sub-index than on People and Planet,” says the report.
“Meanwhile the Brazilian cities of Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo score highly on the Planet sub-index, but are impacted by weak People and Profit scores.,” it adds. “In these cities, the areas of potential improvement are clearer, but this also suggests that sustainability could prove more sensitive to changing economic circumstances or shifts in environmental policy.”
It also points out that the trade-off between Planet and Profit is most starkly seen in the Middle East where Dubai and Doha score much higher in Profit than Planet sustainability where they rank in the bottom four.
Other headlines include:
The report points out that while city leaders in all 50 cities must plan for population increases over the coming 15 years, but the pressure on some is now “immense”.
“Whilst Tokyo’s citizens are expected to increase by just 1% by 2030, Nairobi’s population will grow by 121% and Shanghai will grow by 54% to over 30 million people,” says the report.
For detail of the report click here.
1. Frankfurt
2. London
3. Copenhagen
4. Amsterdam
5. Rotterdam
6. Berlin
7. Seoul
8. Hong Kong
9. Madrid
10. Singapore
41. Rio de Janeiro
42. Doha
43. Moscow
44. Jeddah
45. Riyadh
46. Jakarta
47. Mumbai
48. Wuhan
49. New Delhi
50. Nairobi