The Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, holds a webinar to celebrate 2023 World Town Planning Day on 8th of November. The theme of the event is: “Learn Globally, Apply Locally”. In line with the theme of the event this year, the webinar will feature a lecture titled: “Learn Globally, Apply Locally: An Approach towards Sustainable Town Planning in Nigeria”. The guest speaker is a World Bank Urban Planning and Development Specialist, Dr Oluwaseun Olowoporoku, while the host of the event is Dr Oluwole Daramola, the Acting Head of the Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria.

Like every international day, the World Town Planning Day was initiated to advance public and professional interests in Town Planning and to give a special recognition to the ideals and role of Town Planning profession and the general public together in creating liveable communities. World Town Planning Day presents an opportunity to look at Town Planning from both local and global perspectives as an event which appeals to the conscience of citizens and public authorities in order to draw attention to the environmental impact resulting from the development of human settlements.

The developing world, including Nigeria, has only enjoyed a limited measure of the benefits of Town Planning. This is because due recognition has not been given to the profession and its practice. The signs of lack of attention to Town Planning in our clime are quite visible, ranging from disorganized physical environment, disjointed road networks, uncoordinated housing development to lack of physical and social infrastructure, making way for the springing up of informal settlements, congestion of limited facilities and thereby putting a strain on the capacity of the urban areas for resilience to natural and artificial disasters.

Town Planning has been used effectively to cope with issues of unsustainable development, population growth and climate change. The experience of varying disasters across the world has now, more than ever, brought to fore the significance of Town Planning and the need for us to plan our human settlements, particularly urban areas which are said to accommodate about 55% of the world’s population. Areas with best practices of Town Planning have demonstrated capacity for resilience which those without Town Planning do not have. This fact points to the need to embrace Town Planning from global to national and to local levels. We should learn globally and apply locally. Policy makers, the political class, and the public need to understand that all programmes and promises have spatial implications, and that makes Town Planning, which emphasises spatial arrangement of human activities, very important.

The Department of Urban and Regional Planning, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, is willing, ready and available to provide academic and professional services, in this regard, as our contribution to the redevelopment of our human settlements. We wish all Nigerians and all world citizens good celebration of the World Town Planning Day 2023.

Dr Oluwole Daramola (MNITP, RTP)

Ag Head, Department of Urban and Regional Planning,

Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria.

+2347033456066

oludara@oauife.edu.ng; oluwoledaramola@gmail.com