Bringing Production Back to the City

- a comprehensive 21^st Century exploration of the various means of production ranging from urban manufacturing to the emergence of green sustainable industries and urban farming.

The 42^nd annual SCUPAD Congress 2010 will focus on how these activities will pro-vide jobs for the diverse populations that reside in cities and influence the form, patterns of circulation, architecture, urban design and planning of cities.

 Over the last few decades, cities in the advanced capitalist countries have lost their function as centers of manufacturing. This is due in part to inexpensive transportation and communication systems made possible through the subsidization of fossil fuels, and the externalization of environmental and social costs that have harmful effects on our eco-system. As a result manufacturing functions today are dispersed throughout the world and metropolitan areas are being transformed into places of consumption and privileged locations for finance and knowledge based services.
 The recent world-wide economic crisis created in large part because of this has made us keenly aware of the over-reliance on the global financial sector and need to diversify our economies and to address the needs of the “other city” –the pockets of poverty and exclusion that exist within every city.
 Despite the significant deindustrialization process of the last decades, manufacturing still plays an important role in the urban economy, mainly as “silent partner” to other sectors, such as the creative, cultural and health care industries. This form of urban manufacturing is no longer characterized by the smoke-stack industries of the past, but by a mix of small- and medium-sized firms that are related to local demand and the city’s financial, artistic and service industries.  
 At the same time, the emergence in the last few years of green industries provides unexploited job and business opportunities, and has the potential to foster sustainable growth for the local economy and improve urban living conditions, as well as reduce negative impacts on the environment.  New urban manufacturing and green industries can provide important employment opportunities, particularly jobs for people with different cultural backgrounds and qualifications, thus serving as “gateways” to social and cultural integration.
 A third opportunity to bring production back to the city is the rise of the urban agriculture movement fueled in part by a renewed awareness of nature and the need for greater food security, which in many North American and European cities is already conducted in backyards, rooftops and community gardens. Urban agriculture can combine the production of healthy food with job creation and spaces for community-building and social cohesion.
 Some have hypothesized that these new means of production will be the catalyst for the next urban industrial revolution albeit a clean and less exploitative one. (Based on two books on the subject entitled “Natural Capitalism" by Lovins, Lovins and Hawkins and “Capitalism As If the World Matters” by Jonathan Porritt.)
 SCUPAD Congress 2010 will focus on the impacts of production on economic, social, envi-ronmental, land use and urban design issues. The Congress will open with a keynote address framing the issues followed by case study presentations, papers and discussions in three working groups (on urban manufacturing, green industries and urban agriculture) to explore these issues in detail.