Importance of Urbanization

Keywords: impact of urbanisation, benefits of urbanisation

A city is a symbol of human civilization; it is the people’s economic and political center. A city is a measure of the degree of urbanization of a country and contributes to the regional economic, social, cultural, development, as well as to science and technology.

The national and regional social organizations can be measured by the extent and management of the expansion of local cities. Urbanization is an inevitable part of human progress and to go through this process, brings about structural change.

The process of urbanization is also the goal of modernization. This article will give the reader an all-round understanding of urbanization. It will show that the urbanization has a positive impact on society.

Urbanization is a common phenomenon in human kind. This is often related to a population growth. Both of them have an essential effect on the population distribution. The growth of urbanization results in the development of the world economy, and contributes the emerging level of industrialization.

According to the general view, the expansion of the industrial sector will create an increase in urban population. This circumstance is easier to be seen in the early stage of industrialization. Because the increase in industrial growth depends on labor, large numbers of rural people flood the cities, which cause the population unbalanced.

Many big cities come into being “because of the merging of cities”.(Debroy, 2009) However, in developing countries, the differences of living level between cities and rural area causes dissatisfaction for people from rural areas, so that may be their strong motivation to go into big cities to seize the opportunities offered, and to realize their dreams.

Industrialization of a country also has an important role in leading to changes in urban population numbers. “Population administration was a comprehensive task needing support and cooperation among various government departments”. (Cai, 2010).

A society which is urbanized doesn’t only mean a change of people’s life styles; it is a new culture that is totally different from an agricultural society, and it is also the promising way of human development.

The experience of developed countries shows that industrialization is the driving force of urbanization; and migration is the access to urbanization. Urbanization is a product of the division of labor and achievements of technology.

But with the development of urbanization, all kinds of environmental problems emerge; these problems are one kind of product of urbanization.

Another factor is agricultural modernization, which means the transforming progress from traditional agriculture to modern agriculture. During this period modern science and technology are use to manage the economy, and together to make the old change into a brand new form of agricultural that can be to top of the world.

Agricultural modernization is not only the process but also a mean to achieve this something .Today more rural people go into the cities, which reduces the rural population. At the same time, cities occupy more and more rural lands. These two reasons influence the agricultural modernization so that it can meet people’s needs.

Therefore, the modernization of agriculture is also an important manifestation of urbanization.

But increasingly, the level of urbanization will be associated with some serious consequences. First of all, the development of the urbanization on the natural environment has a negative impact. It has increased the people’s need of the water. As the water resource for humans is limited, the process of urban expansion puts pressure on the water supply and demand will further intensify.

Meanwhile, the development of city areas increased waste. These pollutants of the waste in the city’s water environment caused by various interruption to the global water cycle resulting water pollution. Due to technical reasons, the city’s atmospheric environment contains large amounts of industrial emissions, and this greatly influenced the city’s air quality.

As the city has intensive industrial production and human activities, a number of pollutants which are adverse to human’s health are found in high concentrations of toxic elements as pollutants. Urbanization as an economic development around the world is inconsistent, leading to uneven geographical distribution of the population.

Although urbanization has many drawbacks, and it has brought a rapid change in people’s lives, a city represents the economic center of regional development, and communication. For example:

Since the Xiamen Special Economic Zone was officially established in 1981, the city has become an important staging post for economic and cultural communication between Xiamen and Taiwan, due largely to their geographic proximity. (Hu, 2010)

This indicates that urbanization can raise the level of the regional economy. A country or region’s level of urbanization reflects the socio-economic level of development. Engels said: “There are benefits to settle in the city.” Urbanization can contribute to regional socio-economic development; it will also help improve the local industrial structure. Urbanization can bring all walks of life into close contact with all kinds of opportunities. And it makes substantial increase in the probability of product innovation, resulting in a huge gathering of efficiency and economies of scale.

This makes the non-agricultural industries lower costs and has a higher efficiency. Some experts believe that since the 80s of the 20th, the century 10% of China’s economic growth is gained in the process of urbanization, which illustrates urbanization has played an important role in economic development.

Urbanization also helps conserve resources. Urbanization on saving arable land has an irreplaceable role. Urbanization is conducive to cultural and technological innovation. Non-agricultural industries made the city have increased investment income and acceleration conditions for development.

Therefore, knowledge-based economy in the city’s is an inherent necessity, which will drive growth throughout the economy to achieve a positive and fundamental change. Urbanization is conducive to ecological and environmental protection. “Human beings are adaptable to urban environments and rapidly create social support systems if given the opportunity.” (Newman, 2006).

Urbanization separates people who inhabited this place. Living area such as in the mountains, lakes, wetlands and other development areas should not be moved out, it reduces the development of human activities on natural and restored the natural state of these places.

Urbanization of these areas to restore to the natural state is an important aspect of protecting the environment. In the long run, human beings should be cluster in urban areas. The restoration of human nature should make more space for nature to create better conditions for recovery. This may be a higher level of protection of nature.

Urbanization is good and desirable. It goes hand in hand with economic development. Thanks to migration and improved connectivity some disappear. Others become mainstreamed into urban agglomerations or are reclassified as development proceeds. All these are desirable developments. (Debroy, 2009)

Although it has many negative aspects for the society, and the environment everyone can not just simply pay attention to it is detrimental aspects. An urbanized society is not just a kind of human residential pattern of change. It is completely different from the agricultural society for new levels of civilization, and it is a necessary stage of human development.

Urbanization and industrialization are both linked. It is not only the requirements of modern mass production methods, but also an important part of changing social structure. It is a necessary process of modernization and forms. Urbanization is the division of labor and technological progress of human society, of civilization an important symbol of the development

No single country can complete modernization by excluding the case of urbanization. After the being urbanized, can humanity advance to a more productive future. Careful and strategic planning of urbanization can make our world more and more beautiful. The environmentally positive urbanization can make the human society more perfect.