Secovi-SP’s Affordable Housing Vice-Presidency and SindusCon-SP’s Low-Income Housing Committee met on Thursday, September 17. The meeting combined updates on sector-specific agendas with a presentation of Pólis Global —a joint initiative by CEBRI and the Urbem Institute aimed at coordinating the real estate sector’s involvement in international discussions on climate, technology, and urban development.
Philip Yang, CEO of the Urbem Institute and a member of CEBRI’s International Advisory Board, stated: “Urbem has completed 15 years of work focused on structuring projects at the urban scale. The private sector is extremely competent at the level of individual plots and real estate development, but the city must also be conceived at a broader scale—where urban connections actually take place.” Regarding the new initiative, he said that “Pólis Global aims to create a platform where the construction business sector does not merely respond passively to climate and technological shifts, but leads in formulating responses to these challenges, both domestically and in international arenas.” Philip highlighted that “less than 5% to 10% of resources from international climate funds reach the municipal level” and that “every real estate development and construction company will very soon be, essentially, a technology company,” noting that “at Urbem, we have developed tools capable of overlaying more than 180 layers of georeferenced data with a single click—analyses that, just three years ago, would have required months of consultancy work.”
Fernanda Cimini, Senior Fellow at CEBRI and Associate Professor in the Economics Department at UFMG, detailed the initiative’s pillars. “We structured the Global Polis program around four pillars: geopolitics, multilateralism, and cities; climate security; public security and urban design; and spatial intelligence and data. Next week, we will present the initiative at Climate Week NYC, at the Permanent Mission of Brazil to the UN,” she stated. According to her, “the program is designed for a two-year cycle, featuring the creation of the Urban Implementation Lab and an annual conference, with institutional and corporate co-sponsorship quotas totaling R$ 5 million.”
Izabella Teixeira, Member of the International Advisory Board at CEBRI, offered insights into the material limits of urbanization. “Global demand for biomass, metal ores, aggregates, and cement is set to double by 2060. How does the Brazilian construction sector intend to operate in this scenario of material scarcity and pressure to decarbonize?” she asked. Regarding climate adaptation in buildings, she stated: “There is no sustainable solution based on installing three air-conditioning units in social housing apartments; the electrical grid would collapse. We need to rethink architectural design, natural ventilation, urban vegetation cover, and thermal insulation technologies.” Teixeira also drew attention to the reality of the Amazon region: “80% of the 28 million inhabitants of the Amazon region live in cities with substandard infrastructure. Why isn't the national real estate sector leading projects for sustainable Amazonian housing adapted to the humid tropical climate?”
Read the full article at: https://secovi.com.br/secovi-sp-e-sinduscon-sp-debatem-inadimplencia-fgts-e-chegada-do-nucleo-de-cidades-inteligentes-do-cebri/
