The Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 11 objectives in Southeast Asia, especially in Indonesia, Malaysia, and Vietnam, are intricately connected to urban spatial planning as a vital instrument for realising sustainable cities. Since Southeast Asia is urbanising rapidly, this project initiated the development of a prototype for Science-Based Urban Spatial Planning (SciBUSP), recognising the imperative for a novel, data-informed approach to urban planning. SciBUSP amalgamates geospatial intelligence, satellite remote sensing, and AI-driven analytics to deliver real-time evidence-based insights that can guide policy and decision-making processes. Those technologies have greatly expanded to planners, yet the human and institutional capacity to use those resources coherently remains uneven across regions. This project addresses that gap by combining a concept and practical toolkit with a structured capacity-building programme and a rigorous evaluation framework. As the SciBUSP initiative aims to strengthen the capacity of the early careers professional in Southeast Asia, a comprehensive capacity building programme was implemented, consisting of a Training of Trainers (ToT), followed by a series of national and regional workshops within Southeast Asia

The project pursues an objective to implement a comprehensive capacity building program that empowers early careers, through training workshops and collaborative projects, enabling them to manage and apply Big Earth Data tools effectively through the SciBUSP initiative. The methodology comprised preparatory coordination, codesign and development of the SciBUSP toolkit and instruments through three focus group discussions, and a hybrid kick-off meeting, prior to cascading capacity building and its evaluations.

A ToT was held in Jakarta from April 13 to 19, 2026 for early careers from Indonesia,  Malaysia, and China, Experts also invited from Indonesia, Bangladesh and China.  The TOT resulted five qualified as Master Trainers, just below the target of six. The master trainers then led a national workshop di Bogor, Indonesia, held from 5 to 10 July 2026, attended by 47 participants. Then, a regional workshop di Kuala Lumpur Malaysia, hosted by Universiti Teknologi Malaysia (UTM), held on 26 August to September 1^st 2026, attended by 25 participants.  Because Hanoi workshop cannot be proceeded, Vietnamese participants jointed the Kuala Lumpur event. Together, the two workshops reached more than 60 participants who meet the project target.

Proficiency and effectiveness of the workshop were evaluated using Kirkpatrick’s model, Hake’s normalised gain and Cohen’s effect size. Across 44 participants with matched assessment, self-assessed understanding rose from 3.47 to 4.15 on a five-point scale, a normalised gain of 0.445 (*p* < 0.001; *d*z = 0.94), and the proportion rated as proficient doubled from 31.8 % to 63.6 % from both workshops. The two produced statistically indistinguishable raw gains (+0.69 in Bogor and +0.67 in Kuala Lumpur) with no detectable heterogeneity, confirming that the programme performed consistently. All seven curriculum topics improved the participants’ knowledge significantly, and provided further evidence of the SciBUSP workshop’s effectiveness, particularly in strengthening participants‘ knowledge, practical competencies, and self-reported readiness to apply the SciBUPS concept and tool in their future urban planning activities.