what is that all about?

‘Green Infrastructure is the Nation's natural life support system
- a strategically planned and managed network of countryside in, around and between our towns and cities that supports native species, maintains natural ecological processes, sustains air and water resources, and contributes to the health and quality of life for communities and people.

“living close to open green space has been shown to enhance people’s well-being”




What do we get from the environment for our well-being?

“Life support system” that provide

• Air

• Water

• Raw Materials

Public benefits

• Attractive places to live

• Enjoyment of the outdoors

• Community involvement

• Health

Hong Ca Commune, Tran Yen District, Yen Bai Province, August 6, 2007. “It’s like a dream now”, Ha Giap Hung points to his new motorbike. He has brought it since the Ca Noc bridge was built over the violent stream in front of his house, in Hong Ca Commune, Tran Yen District, Yen Bai northern province.


(Pic) Ha Giap Hung and his motorbike. Before, even if Hung had money, he could not buy it because there was no way to cross the rapid stream.

Whenever flashfloods came, Ha Giap Hung couldn’t do anything. His house is on one side of the stream, while his field is on the other. “I often had to stay on the other side and couldn’t get home, some times for few days,” Hung, a Tay ethnic minority man recalled.

Being in a rough terrain area, Hong Ca Commune is split into smaller areas by streams, hills and mountains. The commune was often isolated during flooding season.

“Now with my motorbike, I can go anywhere, anytime, thanks to the Ca Noc bridge” Hung adds. Being able to go to the field regularly, Hung earns more and could even afford a TV, radio and an electric pumps for his field work.

“Mr. Hung’s example shows that people can be better off with small investments tailored to the local needs. The World Bank can create opportunity and hope,” World Bank Group President Robert B. Zoellick said while visiting Hung’s family during his Asia trip.

Zoellick also called upon Ms. Ha Thi Tam, a local farmer whose electricity has changed her life.

“I now have an electric pump, which helps me with farming work. Currently I have 3000 m2 of farm land, but I plan to expand my field further”

Hung and Tam are just two of the 165,000 people from various ethnic groups in the province, including Mong, Tay, Dao, Thai and Kinh, have significantly been improved thanks to this project.

During his trip, Mr. Zoellick affirmed that the World Bank will continue to help the government in poverty reduction, which is reflected in recent Bank commitment to provide resources for the Program 135 Phase 2.

“Vietnam is a great development story from which many other developing countries can learn,” Mr. Zoellick said. “I want to listen to our stakeholders and learn how the Government has used the money and development expertise provided through the International Development Association (IDA).

It is one of the most powerful examples of how IDA works as a platform that supports the work of all donors and development partners.”

Zoellick visited a power station, built with support from the World Bank supportedSystem Efficiency Improvement, Equitization and Renewables Project. The station is a crucial middle point of the 220 kV link that transmit imported electricity from China to Vietnam's system.

Another World Bank supported project, the Vietnam Rural Electricity Project has extended the access to electricity for about 20,465 households in Yen Bai province alone.

(Pic) Electricity, with support from the World Bank, has reached far and remote areas like Hong Ca Commune.

Although Ha Thi Tam doesn’t know that the electricty grid in her commune was constructed under the Vietnam Rural Electricity Project, she knows exactly what electricity brings to her, and the future seems bright.

“I have a fan for the hot day, and a TV so that I know what’s going on, and the latest farming techniques.”

source : http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/COUNTRIES/EASTASIAPACIFICEXT/VIETNAMEXTN/0,,contentMDK:21436727~menuPK:387571~pagePK:2865066~piPK:2865079~theSitePK:387565,00.html

Pseudo-urbanization is the condition in which a large city has formed in an area without a functional infrastructure to support it. As the population of an urbanized area grows, the city's infrastructure must grow with it, or else shortages will develop, typically in housing, transportation, clean water and waste removal services, or other services such as law enforcement. Overpopulation in urban areas is often characterized by shanty towns, where such services are inadequate or wholly absent. A city much of whose recent growth has been in the absence of adequate infrastructure will be "pseudo-urbanized".

Urbanization in the third world tends to consist primarily of pseudo-urbanization. This happens largely because of so-called "rural push": factors which push people from the countryside into the cities, without the city being prepared to accept them. Rural-urban migrants in the third world usually move into the cities because of poverty related reasons, leading to a demographic explosion and a progressive concentration of poor migrants in the cities. This is a finite process, as one city can only hold so many people due to limited infrastructure and available resources.

References:

• Pranati Datta (21 June 2006). "Urbanisation in India" (PDF). Retrieved on 2007-05-07.
• Davis, Mike (2006). Planet of Slums. Verso. ISBN 1844670228.

 The report, The Information Infrastructure: Reaching
Society's Goals, was released at the "Breaking the Barriers to
the National Information Infrastructure" conference in
Washington, D.C.

    "Effectively using sophisticated communications networks and
information technology can make a difference not just in how
people work, but in how well they live," said Brown, chairman of
the Clinton administration's Information Infrastructure Task
Force, which co-sponsored the conference with the Council on
Competitiveness.

    The report is a collection of eight papers, each of which
explores the benefits for a particular application area.  The
papers help define a national vision for how advanced
communications and computing technologies can:

• enable people with disabilities to achieve full citizenship in our society;
  

• improve the production, consumption and management of electric power;
  

• increase the safety and efficiency of our transportation system;
  

• allow greater flexibility and worker satisfaction through telecommuting;
  

• save lives and property in times of large-scale emergencies and natural disasters;
  

• empower citizen action to maintain a clean environment;
  

• ensure that non-profit cultural institutions maintain their position on the front lines of popular creativity and expression; and
  

• further educate and better inform both citizens and the agencies they rely upon to maintain public safety.
  

source : http://www.nist.gov/public_affairs/releases/g94-83.htm

According to international ratings, Switzerland has the best-developed and maintained and developed infrastructure in Europe. With its dense network of freeways and railways, neighbouring countries are easy to reach. Thanks to well developed flight connections, European business centers are less than two hours travel away.

Service and operational reliability are ensured at all times even under sometimes difficult climatic and geographic conditions. The ongoing liberalization of the markets encourages competition in various infrastructure service sectors. This makes Switzerland an excellent logistics hub for internationa companies.

In terms of safety and health, residents have no need for concern. Switzerland is considered to be a particularly safe country with a health care system that is among the best in the world.

High quality homes and apartments satisfy the most demanding requirements, and the country’s scenic beauty and cultural diversity offer all forms of leisure activities.

Switzerland is rated as one of the best countries in the world for its quality of life. Zurich and Geneva are ranked as the cities with the highest quality of life; Bern is ranked seventh.

Swiss precision is also applied in the country’s infrastructure

Swiss infrastructure is among the best developed and reliable in the world.

State-of-the-art IT infrastructure and tools create optimum conditions for the development of new technologies.

The commercial real estate market has an ample supply of land and buildings for economic activities, and the restrictions on property ownership by foreign nationals have been considerably relaxed in recent years.

Companies who choose to list on the SWX Stock Exchange benefit from the attractive tax structure and corporate laws, which enable institutional investors to invest more aggressively in securities.

source : http://www.locationswitzerland.ch/internet/osec/en/home/invest/factors/infrastructure.html

for the introduction i would like to define the subject of my blog site that i need to be done...

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Quality of life is the degree of well-being felt by an individual or group of people.

Unlike standard of living, quality of life is not a tangible thing, and so cannot be measured directly. It consists of two components: physical and psychological. The physical aspect includes things such as health, diet, and protection against pain and disease. The psychological aspect includes stress, worry, pleasure and other positive or negative emotional states.

Infrastructure typically means to the technical structures that support a society, such as roads, water supply, wastewater, power grids, flood management systems, telecommunications (Internet, telephone lines, broadcasting), and so forth. In the past, these systems have typically been owned and managed by local or central governments. These various elements may collectively be termed civil infrastructure, municipal infrastructure, or simply public works, although they may be developed and operated in the private sector or in public-private partnership in additional to in the public sector. Viewed functionally, infrastructure facilitates the production of goods and services; for example, roads enable the transport of raw materials to the production plant and distribution of finished products to markets.

(Pic): Interstate 80, the second-longest U.S. Interstate highway, runs from California to New Jersey

Recent efforts to devise more generic definitions of infrastructure have typically referred to the network aspects of most of the structures and to the accumulated value of investments in the networks as assets. One such effort defines infrastructure as the network of assets "where the system as a whole is intended to be maintained indefinitely at a specified standard of service by the continuing replacement and refurbishment of its components."[1] However, the principles that civil infrastructure is meant to have unlimited service life and always provide some specified minimum standard of service are neither inherent to the concept nor generally accepted by the societies served.

In other applications, the term infrastructure may refer to information technology, informal and formal channels of communication, software development tools, political and social networks, or beliefs held by members of particular groups. Still underlying these more conceptual uses is the idea that infrastructure provides organizing structure and support for the system or organization it serves, whether it is a city, a nation, a corporation, or a collection of people with common interests.

From my point of view infrastructure or so called public facilities for the people are more or less based on the physical development to an area. These physical development such as roads are important in urban planning to bring facilities from urban area to less developed area in order to achieve quality in life among the people in terms of economy and socially.

hello to all viewers..i'm mohd hafifi bin harun..

this is my blog which is the first time that i ever tried to post..

so to my fellow friends and lecturers forgive me if you did find any mistakes in my column and please give me a feedback ok??

enjoi!!