3rd - 5th DECEMBER 2008 - 2ND INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCE ON BUILT ENVIRONMENT IN DEVELOPING COUNTRIES 2008

The inaugural International Conference on Built Environment in Developing Countries (ICBEDC 2007) which was held in December 3rd-4th, 2007 at Universiti Sains Malaysia, had attracted 125 papers from all over the world, mainly researchers and academia from Developing Countries such as Myanmar, Thailand, Republic of Iran, Indonesia, Oman, Yemen, Saudi Arabia, Nigeria, Vietnam, Japan, Australia, Holland and many more. The conference was organized in 6 parallel sessions of specific sub-themes for the duration of the 2 days.

Following the outstanding success of the 1st ICBEDC2007, we, the organizers, the School of Housing , Building and Planning, Universiti Sains Malaysia , is organizing a higher impact follow-up conference. The theme of the 2nd ICBEDC2008 is “Sustainable Built Environment: Bridging Theory and Practice”. By adopting this theme, we are reinforcing our commitment in promoting sustainable practices in the development of the built environment in developing countries as we are still very much in the process of seriously adopting and implementing the prophesy of a truly sustainable environment. Issues on global warming, growing scarcity of non-renewable energy resources, loss of biodiversity, shortage of water supply and the long term degradation of the ecosystem along with health and poverty problems are among the most important issues which represent a growing and escalating risk for human societies and their economy.

I and Assoc Prof Dr Hamzah bin Jusoh are going to present a paper with title EFFICIENT URBAN GOVERNANCE IN ENHANCING COMPETITIVENESS OF CITY REGION. Abstract of the paper is :

This paper discusses on the preliminary study on efficiency in urban governance towards enhancing competitiveness of the city. The focus of this paper is to analyse the literature review on the concept of efficiency in urban governance. Preliminary discuss with selected local authorities in Klang Valley has been carried out to gain their understanding on the efficient urban governance. Malaysia has successfully applied economic planning to guide the development of the country from an economy of agriculture and mining to a largely industrialised one. Now, with its sights set on attaining the economic level of a fully developed nation by 2020, the planning system must be made even more efficient and focused. The country must focus on securing a credible share of the lead sectors of the globalised economy. The country must also be fully aware of the enormous competition it faces in a region with rapidly expanding and modernising economies, all contending for the same pool of potential international investments. The urban sector is an important catalyst towards national economic growth and a vital investment centre for the nation. Efficient urban governance is characterized by sustainability, subsidiarity, equity, efficiency, transparency and accountability, civic engagement and citizenship, and security. In line with this, the importance of efficient urban governance is eminent in administration of developing city like Kuala Lumpur City Region. Efficient urban governance is also fundamental issue in development.