Photo of the Guangzhou International Award for Urban Innovation Assessment System Conference.

The Guangzhou International Award for Urban Innovation Assessment System Conference  (Civitas Novus), jointly organized by the Guangzhou Institute for Urban Innovation and the University of Pennsylvania Institute for Urban Research (Penn IUR), was held in Cairo, Egypt, on Nov 5.

The conference aimed to showcase the latest advancements in urban innovation research to cities around the globe and the international community as a whole, fostering discussions on the opportunities, challenges, primary trends, and strategies for large-scale promotion of urban innovation.

Lei Weiju, deputy director of the foreign affairs office of the people's government of Guangzhou municipality, stated at the conference that Guangzhou has been actively advancing global urban governance and sustainable development for an extended period, facilitating exchanges and cooperation among cities through the Guangzhou International Award for Urban Innovation. Furthermore, it has supported the collaboration between the institution and Penn IUR in developing an urban innovation assessment system.

Conference attendees expressed their belief that cities, regardless of their social systems or developmental stages, possess immense opportunities for cooperation in urban governance. Cities should therefore enhance exchanges to jointly propel progress and achieve the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

The Guangzhou Award Urban Innovation Assessment System is a tool designed to enhance urban governance innovation capabilities. Based on the experiences of outstanding Guangzhou Award cases, the research team has developed a series of assessment scales encompassing core competencies of urban innovation, aiding city managers in comprehensively understanding and improving their city's innovation ecosystem in areas such as innovative ideas, resource management, challenge response, and the industrialization of innovation achievements, as well as in formulating effective innovation strategies. In September this year, a pilot workshop for the assessment system was successfully held in Turkey, validating its effectiveness and providing valuable feedback for system optimization.

At the conference, guests shared their successful experiences related to urban innovation, covering policy formulation, project implementation, and ecosystem building. The meeting featured in-depth analyses of multiple typical innovation cases, showcasing specific practices and their outcomes, as well as offering valuable insights to other cities. Additionally, discussions focused on how to build and optimize urban innovation ecosystems in order to stimulate innovation and promote the industrialization and large-scale application of innovation achievements.