The Malaysian Urban Indicators Network (MURNInet) is a Computer Based Application System to measure and evaluate the sustainability of towns and cities in Malaysia, developed by the Ministry of Housing and Local Development of Malaysia. Ever since its inception in 1997, MURNInet which piloted six towns in 2002, has progressed to include all 149 local authorities in Malaysia to date. It is instrumental in identifying the sustainability level in towns and cities and has fostered co-operation with all the chief ministers of Malaysia to improve sustainability of urban areas including local governance. In addition, MURNInet has also been presented at the international level and has received encouraging feedback from various research houses which are also working on initiatives related to sustainability indicators.

The Mwelu Foundation is a group of 50 ambitious, positive and talented children working in the Mathare Valley slum of Nairobi, Kenya to realize their own potential through photography, film production and the building of life skills and to spread a positive attitude within their community.

Anji city, with an area of 1,886 square km and a population of 450,000, is located in the northwest of Zhejiang Province, 220 km from Shanghai and 65 km from Hangzhou. In 2009, its local GDP reached USD2.3 billion and per capita GDP reached USD5,065, which is 1.36 times that of China’s per capita GDP. Its history can be traced back 1,825 years ago when the emperor of China gave the city the name “Anji”, meaning “an auspicious safe place”. Anji is a city surrounded by bamboos and has a bamboo area of 72,000 hectares. Anji used to be dirty, disorderly and poor. However, since the turn of the 21st century, propped by abundant bamboo resources, the Anji government, by fully tapping its ecological advantage and highlighting the quality of rural and urban development, has built the city into a graceful bamboo city within 10 years, characterized by a low-carbon lifestyle.