
Operated by the Technical University Darmstadt, GERMANY
An international programme for students from all countries.
Since the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 sustainability is a principle for any development in the world. Sustainable development means attaining a balance between human economic, social and cultural development as well as environmental protection and between present and future needs. That comprises equity in development and sectoral actions across space and time and requires an integration of economic, social and environmental approaches towards development.
Spatial planning – a multidisciplinary task: Urban planners have to meet complex problems. Segregation, demographics, traffic, and climate are only some of the main objectives cities have to deal with. Besides, the economical profit and loss of urban development should be distributed fairly.
Vietnams’s economy for example has experienced rapid growth which also affects the urban and rural development. According to a 2008 forecast by PricewaterhouseCoopers, Vietnam may be the fastest-growing of the world's emerging economies in 2025. At the same time, the Vietnam demographics profile shows a fast growing population as well as a rate of urbanisation of 3 % per year. This results in social and economical disparity as well as the requirement of a sustainable handling of resources. These functional, economical, social and ecological demands assign urban planners for new tasks. As a consequence, they need a broad education in sustainable urban development and related sciences, economical sciences, as well as sciences related to infrastructure.
Spatial planning – instruments needed: To analyse, measure, balance and assess the situation as well as to make a decision, urban planners need to be able to handle different instruments of urban development. Spatial data modelling as well as real estate appraisal models, empirical methods (statistics) and traffic analysis are some of those instruments the students are introduced to.