SHAPING THE FUTURE HOW CHANGING DEMOGRAPHICS CAN POWER HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

BOX 5.4:
The Metro-Manila Development Authority:
Mandated responsibilities come with limits
In 1995 the Congress of the Philippines passed
a law establishing the Metro-Manila Development
Authority and designating Metro-Manila
as a special development and administrative
region. The Authority was given powers related
to metro-wide development planning; transport
and traffic management; solid waste disposal
and management; urban renewal, zoning
and land use planning; health and sanitation;
urban protection and population control; and
public safety.
But despite its mandated responsibilities, the
Authority cannot override local authorities. It
can carry out its responsibilities only without
affecting the autonomy of local government
units (7 cities and 10 municipalities) within its
area. As a result, often it acts as an adviser.
Source: Oreta 1996.
BOX 5.5:
An urban infrastructure deficit in Karachi
The population of Pakistan’s largest city, Karachi,
has more than doubled since 1990,
making it one of the fastest growing cities in
the world. Despite multiple urbanization plans,
implementation obstacles prevail. These include
frequent procedural delays, an unclear
institutional framework and weak coordination
among municipal agencies.
The lack of planned citywide infrastructure
has resulted in significant service deficits. For
example, the Karachi Circular Railway, the only
nationwide commuter train, terminated service
in 1999. Future population growth will only
compound this gap, which will be further exacerbated
by the environmental consequences of
increased use of private vehicles.
Sources: Gopinathan 2014, Kahn 2014, Qureshi and Huapu
2007, Dawn News 2015, World Bank 2015d.
In some cases, local or national governments
can set up metropolitan entities, such as the
Metro-Manila Development Authority. But such
arrangements are complicated in practice and
require clear policy and management structures,
and the capacity to address interjurisdictional
issues (Box 5.4).
Large metropolitan areas—including mega-urban
corridors (e.g., the Mumbai-Pune
development corridor in India), megacity-dominated
metropolitan regions (e.g., Metro Manila
in the Philippines) and subnational mega-urban
regions (e.g., the Pearl River delta region in China)—usually
have governance structures falling
in one of three basic types. 44 These may allow
autonomous local governance, where each city,
town and municipality within the city-region
is in charge of its own planning, policy-making,
regulation, etc. Under mixed regional governance
systems, the most common type, authority
and responsibilities are distributed to different
institutions and levels of government. Unified
regional governance involves a single governing
body that plans, manages, finances, supports
and maintains services in an area-wide territory.
The devolution of administrative powers in
some countries permits the election of heads of
city administration and more autonomy, such
as in terms of budgets. Motivations and models
for decentralization are diverse, 45 but a common
tendency is for fiscal decentralization to fail to
follow on the heels of administrative decentralization,
leaving cities with responsibilities, but
not much control over resources to pay for them.
The chronic imbalance between government—
especially local government—responsibilities and
local revenues is in fact an important contributor
to weak governance and corruption.
Especially in small cities, local governments
have limited authority to collect revenues, low
capacity for financial management and planning,
and difficulty accessing private capital, issues that
result in a failure to fully harness local revenue
mobilization potential, and undercut abilities
to provide essential services and infrastructure
(Box 5.5). Table 5.4 summarizes revenue mobilization
authority in three megacities: Jakarta,
Manila and Mumbai.
Most local governments remain highly
dependent on intergovernmental transfers, with
amounts varying. In the Philippines, the man-
Limited authority
to collect revenues
is one major challenge
for local governments
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