In Makoko, residents’ houses and lives, many built on stilts, hover over the polluted, dark waters of the Lagos waterfront and lagoon. But contrary to the perception of the community as a development blight and hurdle to the city’s forward development, the design and urbanism firm NLÉ wants to show that Makoko is an inspiration and a model of adaptation for Africa’s coastal cities: the firm has designed a prototype school, currently under construction, to float on Makoko’s waters, marking an innovative adaptation to challenging circumstances. Read more or join the discussion.
Submitted by Victoria Okoye — Mon, 01/21/2013 – 00:00
Lagos is in a transportation crisis. A city of close to 15 million persons, Lagos is larger than London, but without a train system corresponding to the London Tube. A combination of bad roads, too many cars and trucks, and frequent accidents means that the city is often gridlocked. Everyone who can afford a car buys one, since what passes for public transportation is largely inhospitable — a network of tens of thousands of mini-buses known locally as danfos. In the last few years the government has introduced a bus system that takes advantage of dedicated lanes, but its capacity is a far cry from what is needed. In any case it still has to depend on the overburdened road network. The motorcycle taxis (okadas) that once dominated and defined the metropolis, providing an opportunity for time-challenged travellers to weave through traffic jams, have recently come under the government’s hammer. Without radical and intelligent solutions the situation is bound to worsen, as Lagos is Africa’s fastest growing city, and the World Bank estimates that there will be more than 20 million people in it by 2020. What is clear is that Lagos cannot hope to make a dent on its traffic situation without forms of mass transportation that can convey large numbers of people outside of the road network. The solutions will lie on land — rail lines — and in the water. Read more.
Submitted by Tolu Ogunlesi — Sun, 01/20/2013 – 11:14
Event: Social Media Week Lagos 2013: Open and Connected
18–22 February 2013 
Lagos, Nigeria
Social Media Week is a worldwide event exploring the social, cultural and economic impact of social media. Our mission is to help people and organizations connect through collaboration, learning and the sharing of ideas and information.
February 2013 will mark the first time Social Media Week takes place on the continent of Africa! Social Media Week Lagos brings together thought leaders, creatives, entrepreneurs and everyday citizens from Nigeria – and throughout the continent and the diaspora – to explore how people and organizations are connecting to share new ideas and information.
“By programming keynotes and panels that look at how Africans – Nigerians in particular – are incorporating social media in their unique social, political, and creative landscapes, Social Media Week Lagos will explore just how important being connected to the world is for 21st century Africans” – Ngozi Odita, Executive Director of Social Media Week Lagos. Learn more.
Event: Nigeria Summit 2013: Enabling and Implementing the Change
19–20 March 2013 Lagos, Nigeria
Nigeria has a young and growing population, a wide range of natural resources and a government full of internationally renowned reformers — yet life for the average Nigerian is not improving. There’s no shortage of visions that see Nigeria transformed into a dynamic, competitive economy where entrepreneurialism and innovation thrives. But the real need is for action — at all levels. Bringing together 180+ international business leaders, investors, policymakers and influential commentators, our flagship Nigeria Summit will focus on what is being done to execute the vision. Learn more.
The innovative element of the LagosPhoto Festival is its emphasis on community and public accessibility. In a time and space where artistic appreciation is often a privilege few can afford, the festival brings contemporary art — in this case, photography — to the public by siting exhibitions in key community locations. This year, public spaces like Muri Okunola Park in Victoria Island, Falomo Roundabout in Ikoyi, Oworoshoki-Alapere Median, and UBA Park at the University of Lagos in Yaba are among the festival’s key venues. Learn more.
Submitted by Victoria Okoye — Wed, 10/31/2012 – 01:00
In marginalized Lagos communities like Ajegunle and Oshodi, the BornTroWay Creative Arts Project is empowering and spotlighting youth art creativity. The project started in Ajegunle, considered one of Lagos’ harshest slum settlements — but also a thriving place where some of the country’s premier athletes and performers have grown up. For its youth participants, BornTroWay is making a difference that goes far beyond teaching them to dance, to act, to write a song or rap. Read and discuss.
Submitted by Victoria Okoye — Sat, 10/06/2012 – 01:00
In July, the Lagos State Government razed the homes, businesses, and livelihoods of more than 20,000 residents of the waterfront community of Makoko, a major slum in the megacity. The recent destruction of homes and livelihoods is not a new phenomenon in this waterfront community: Seven years ago, in April 2005, the government led a similar exercise, demolishing houses, churches, shops, and community health clinics, and displacing more than 3,000 people. The trend of these demolitions, and similar ones in Lagos State and across the country over the past few years, highlights the insecure position of land tenancy and title for residents in informal communities and slums like Makoko. Read and discuss.
Submitted by Victoria Okoye — Wed, 09/19/2012 – 01:00
Young girls in low-income, informal settlements such as Iwaya, a waterfront settlement in Lagos, must grow up fast: they are often the informal solution for their families as they struggle with the daily issues of income and infrastructure access. Such responsibilities often force these girls to forego their education to tend to the immediate needs of their households — and without an education, they remain at a distinct disadvantage for the rest of their lives. Action Health Incorporated develops educational solutions that are accessible for out-of-school adolescent girls — starting in Iwaya — to help stem this cycle of poverty. Read and discuss.
Submitted by Victoria Okoye — Wed, 08/22/2012 – 01:00
In Lagos, the systemic challenges facing urban water infrastructure affect each and everyone, from the wealthy oga in his corner office on Victoria Island to the impoverished beggar eking out his subsistence on a walkway in one of the city’s slums. Fewer than 30 percent of the population has access to piped water connections of any kind, and even they must contend with erratic access; meanwhile, for those fetching water at community water points, even when water does flow, it is often anything but drinkable. In short, the shortcomings of government intervention leave a vast gap between supply and demand and have transformed water, especially potable water, into an essential commodity. Read and discuss.
Submitted by Victoria Okoye — Tue, 08/07/2012 – 01:00
Rapid urbanization through natural growth and rural-to-urban migration is overwhelming cities in the emerging world — cities which are already struggling to develop their infrastructure. Lagos, where guest contributor Olatunbosun Obayomi has lived all his life, is no exception. The United Nations estimates that the city’s population will hit 16 million by 2015, making it the world’s 11th-largest urban system. Its population density has already reached an extreme level at 4,193 people per square kilometer. Meanwhile, a combination of official neglect, corruption, extreme poverty, and rapid, largely uncontrolled population growth has led to the decay of the existing urban infrastructure — a key determinant of how livable the city will be. Read and discuss.
Submitted by Lagos — Wed, 06/06/2012 – 01:00
বাংলাদেশে এইচআইভি/এইডস ১৯৮৯ সালে প্রথম সনাক্ত করা হয়। জাতীয় এইডস এবং এসটিআই প্রোগ্রাম (এনএএসপি) অনুমান মতে, ২০১০ সাল পর্যন্ত ৭৫০০ বাংলাদেশী এইচআইভিতে আক্রান্ত হয়ে বসবাস করছে। এই বৃদ্ধিজনক ঘটনার বিপরীতে, মুষ্টিমেয় এনজিও এইচআইভির বিস্তার থামাতে এবং ইতিমধ্যেই সংক্রমিত যারা তাদের সেবা প্রদানের জন্য এইচআইভি/এইডস শিকার এবং তাদের সম্প্রদায়ের সঙ্গে ঘনিষ্ঠভাবে কাজ করা শুরু করেছে।
Despite advances made in natural resource management science, the degradation and the destructive competition for natural resources in most areas of the world has continued more or less unabated. South African fish and seafood stocks, too, generally show no exception. Moreover, there are increasing numbers of applicants, corporations, and communities competing for fishing rights to this shrinking resource. Read more or join the discussion.
Data has emerged showcasing the latest trends of our demographic shift – the global population now articulates a ‘youth bulge’. The UN-Population Demographic Profile (2010) show children, and ‘youths’, comprise 1.6bn, and 1.0bn, of the population in less-developed regions. The population is younger; and Sub-Saharan Africa is no exception. Attention is now turning to youths: what young people do, what opportunities they initiate for their families and nations, and what it means to be ‘young’ in the developing world. However, an important caveat requires recognition: the focus has been particularly male-focused. Our understanding of girls, within both public and private spaces, remains limited. Such is the debate in this blog post – if we are now looking at ‘kids’ in the city and development, what are the experiences of girls? What can we learn about the city through an engendered perspective? Fundamentally, who is responsible to grant equal rights? Two models of intervention are discussed be, each using alternative methods to provide rights for girls. However, each acts to reinforce the need to improve our understandings on ‘being’ a girl. Read more.
Many of us think of urban graffiti as a nuisance, as an illegality, as a challenge to authority. Exactly, especially the last one. And it is also a form a communication, sometimes the only form available to people who aren’t so well represented in the media. Alex Alonso wrote an interesting piece on urban graffiti and its typologies, and discussed how graffiti can provide insight into societal attitudes and perceptions. Graffiti includes political commentary, personal or ‘existential’ messages, gang-related territorial demarcation, simple ‘tags’, elegant ‘piecing’ where tags or names are elaborate, and larger works that, more obviously like art, that combine comment with an clear aesthetic. Read more.
With the holiday season upon us, here are some book suggestions that will be particularly relevant for those involved in the city as urban scholars, professionals, or activists, or interested in issues of urbanism and sustainability in cities. The following books from the African Centre for Cities (ACC) are significant contributions to the study of urbanism in African cities. Read more or join the discussion.
Upon exploring how just and inclusive cities can emerge a key component of analysis is social life — how people act in cities, the complex character of sociability, and the factors designing urban life. Multiple concepts have been raised to define what a city is — and has become, and further, what kind of life materialises within urban spaces. Over time cities have been conceptualised as ‘misanthropic’, expressing disorganisation, violence, and a dense concentration of people whom adopt different mentalities and motives. Such urban personas are expressed through space. Read more.
Politics, technology, infrastructure development, and finance ruled the discussion board in 2013 and laid important cornerstones for future discussions on how the country will develop and evolve.
Nairobi Governor Evans Kidero was voted in on a slew of electoral promises — amongst which, to improve service delivery to the capital, improve the living standards of slum dwellers, and address the problem of Dandora, the city’s overflowing dumpsite. Ten months after elections, the promises are yet to be met: Kidero has held meetings with representatives of Nairobi’s different slums, where he reiterated his commitment to increasing employment opportunities for youth; his wife has made public donations to various slum orphanages; and the Dandora question is under discussion.
In infrastructure development, despite a few hiccups, work on Nairobi’s southern and eastern bypasses continued to move forward, as did the construction of Nairobi’s new international airline terminal, which was launched in December despite the chaos that followed the burning of the arrivals terminal in August this year. The Nairobi light commuter rail network opened a new station, the Safaricom Kasarani stadium was brought to completion, and Machakos county (part of the city’s larger metropolitan area) unveiled its ambitious development plan and how it intends to create Machowood, Kenya’s first dedicated film production studios.
Finance went from strength to strength as the Kenyan stock market continued to rise throughout the year and the government began to recognize that the most sustainable form of development was the one that came from the grassroots. As a result, efforts were stepped up to invest in youth and women’s savings groups through the newly introduced Uwezo Fund.
ঢাকার বস্তিতে বসবাসরত মহিলারা সাধারণত অর্থনৈতিক ব্যাবস্থার ব্যাবহার সঠিক ভাবে করতে পারেন না; অপরুন্তু ডোনার এবং এন জি ও এর কাছ থেকে যে পরিমান অর্থ আসে তা এই বস্তির মহিলারা পান না, কারণ ডোনার এবং এন জি ও এসব বস্তি মূল্যায়ন করে না। এসব মহিলারা কোন ধনশম্পত্তিও পান না এবং তারের কোন ভুমি অধিকারও থাকে নাহ। বস্তুত, খাদ্য এবং কৃষি জরিপ অনুযায়ী বাংলাদেশে কেবল ২% মহিলা ভুমির মালিক, যা প্রতিবেশী দেশগুলোর তুলনায় অত্যন্ত কম। মহিলারা পার্লামেন্টে এবং অন্যান্য কর্মক্ষেত্রে এখন কাজ করলেও ভূমিমালিকাধীন নারীর সংখ্যা এখনো অনেক কম, যা অর্থনৈতিক নিরাপত্তা রক্ষায় অত্যন্ত গুরুত্বপূর্ণ।
In fact, the “State of the Urban Youth India 2012: Employment, Livelihoods, Skills” report that came out last year says that juvenile crime in urban areas of India rose by 40 percent between 2001 and 2010. The youth involved in criminal activity were largely from low-income working families, and the study found that “lack of education is an important factor with over 55 percent juvenile criminals being illiterate or with limited primary education,” says a DNA article reporting on the study.
En el estudio del Especial de Inclusión Financiera de Nextbillion y Ashoka Changemakers, CrediMUJER de Perú afirma que la inclusión financiera está relacionada con el reconocimiento de los derechos de las mujeres, el refuerzo de su autoestima, autonomía económica y control de su vida.
Poverty is one of the most serious challenges facing the world today, with more than 30 percent of the world’s population estimated to be living in multidimensional poverty (UNDP, 2013). In developing countries poverty has been highly associated with rural areas and hence young economically active people have moved to urban areas in the hope of getting better lives for themselves and their families. This view, especially in Zimbabwe, has changed over the last two decades as poverty has become widespread in both urban and rural areas of Zimbabwe, with poverty in urban areas increasing at a faster rate than in rural areas. Results from the Poverty Income Consumption Expenditure Survey (PICES) of 2011/12 carried out by the National Statistics Agency (ZIMSTAT) indicate that 38 per cent per cent of urban households, and almost 47 per cent of people living in urban areas in Zimbabwe were classified as poor. Unlike rural households, urban households almost always require cash to access social services such as health and education and hence greater need for households to have secure and consistent income to meet these costs. The urban dwellers usually face costly accommodation rentals, out-of-pocket payments for health, education, water and power supplies. Urban areas are highly associated with high levels of social fragmentation resulting in declining social cohesion and increased social exclusion especially for the poor women and children. Read more.
Komisi Nasional Perlindungan Anak melaporkan sedikitnya ada 2.637 kasus kekerasan terhadap anak sepanjang tahun 2012 dan 62 persen diantaranya merupakan kekerasan seksual terhadap anak dimana mayoritas korban berasal dari kalangan ekonomi menengah ke bawah. Tren kasus kekerasan terhadap anak meningkat tiap tahunnya. Tingginya angka kekerasan ini menunjukkan betapa buruknya perlindungan anak dan minimnya kebijakan yang berpihak terhadap anak. Secara nasional, negara merespon dengan mengeluarkan undang-undang perlindungan anak yang menyatakan dengan jelas bahwa negara menjamin dan melindungi anak dan hak-haknya agar dapat hidup, tumbuh, berkembang secara optimal serta mendapat perlindungan dari kekerasan dan diskriminasi. Munculnya Undang-undang ini diikuti oleh keluarnya peraturan standar minimum pelayanan terpadu bagi perempuan dan anak korban kekerasan. Baca lebih lanjut atau bergabung dalam diskusi.
Many of Accra’s street children are migrants from other parts of Ghana who followed others in the name of greener pastures. Other street children were trafficked to the city centre by older people and were left to fend for themselves. These children find ways to survive by engaging in activities ranging from being porters to selling goods on the street. The boys often earn money by shining shoes, pushing trucks, gathering refuse and carrying it to the dump site. Many also trade sex for money. In reaction to these alarming hardships, a number of important organizations are working to give these street children a voice, using a number of different approaches. Read more or join the discussion.
In February 2010, 12-year-old Rouvanjit Rawla, a student at a prestigious school in Kolkata, committed suicide after being humiliated and caned by his principal. The Rawla incident set off a firestorm of controversy over widespread accounts of corporal punishment in India’s schools – from the most elite institutions to those run by the government. The Ministry of Women and Child Development subsequently banned physical punishment of students, stating of the consequences, “The first violation of the ban will invite up to one year in jail, or a fine of Rs. 50,000 or both. For subsequent violations, imprisonment could be extended to three years with an additional fine of 25,000 rupees,” says an article on the issue. Despite the measures, reports of students continuing to receive harsh physical and verbal abuses from their superiors continue to plague India’s school system. Read more or join the discussion.
En al año 2001 se constituyó la Red por los Derechos de la Infancia en México (REDIM). Es una sinergia de 73 organizaciones que buscan que se adopte la Convención de los Derechos de los Niños en los marcos legales de México y en el diseño de políticas públicas dirigidas a los niños. Leer más o discutir.
শিশু অধিকার লঙ্ঘনের দুটি চরম প্রতিমূর্তি শিশুদের উপর যৌন নির্যাতন এবং ধর্ষণ। উভয়ই বাংলাদেশে প্রায়শই দেখা যায় এবং দুটিই গুরুতর সমস্যা হিসেবে চিহ্নিত হয়েছে। “আস্ক ডকুমেন্টেশন ইউনিট” এর একটি পরিসংখ্যানে দেখা যায় যে ২০১৩ সালের জানুয়ারী থেকে সেপ্টেম্বর মাসের মধ্যে বাংলাদেশে ৫৪ টি শিশু, ৭ থেকে ১২ বছরের মধ্যে ১০২ জন অপ্রাপ্তবয়স্ক এবং ৮৬ জন কিশোরকিশোরী ধর্ষিত হয়েছে। বলার অপেক্ষা থাকে না যে, এই পরিসংখ্যান যৌন নির্যাতনে শিকার হওয়া শিশুদের প্রকৃত সংখ্যা প্রকাশ করে না। Read more or discuss.
Assegurar que as crianças e adolescentes tenham seus direitos assegurados e protegidos de qualquer forma de violência deveria ser uma prioridade de todos os países. Neste sentido, Brasil vem fazendo vários esforços que envolvem a parceria entre o governo e a sociedade civil, nos níveis nacionais e municipais. Leia mais o discutir.
The urban data revolution is here. From Abidjan to Mumbai to New York, we are beginning to learn about real-time trends: in traffic, land use, even in illegal cooking oil dumping in cities. City data is almost in surplus, and mayors are bombarded with new information on goods and resources every day. Yet little of this data shows us how a city’s most important resource — its people — are living. Read more.
According to UNICEF, roughly 15 million children under the age of 14 were employed in Nigeria’s semi-formal and informal sectors in 2006. The most common forms of employment include street vendors, beggars, shoe shiners, mechanics, bus conductors, and domestic servants. This high incidence of child labor follows Nigeria’s high poverty rate: these children’s labour sometimes serves as the only source of income not only for themselves, but also for their families. Child labour has become an avenue for impoverished families in Lagos to provide basic needs for themselves, at the expense of the child. Read more or join the discussion.
In a small workshop down one of the thousands of twisty, narrow Dharavi lanes, six young men hunch over old-fashioned sewing machines. They are dressed minimally to ward off the May heat. No windows punctuate the cement walls, but a fan swirls noisily above. Their master embroidery skills are mesmerizing to watch. One sewer, now 22, tells us that he started the trade at age 10 when he came to Mumbai on his own. Still a child, he joined thousands of other children across the city in foregoing school for a meager income. Read more or join the discussion.
Dr Evans Kidero, winner of the newly created Gubernatorial seat of Nairobi County, has promised to tackle head-on the majority of the city’s planning, infrastructure, and security problems. Speaking during his inaugural address on the 27th of March this year, Dr Kidero unveiled a seven-point plan with which he intends to bring Nairobi to the status of a World Class African metropolis. The speech highlighted a desire to address the desperate solid waste management situation the city is currently faced with; following that, Dr Kidero promised to focus on infrastructure development, public transport, and replacing informal settlements with low-cost housing. Read more or join the discussion.
Slums are mostly viewed from the outside as alienated environments in which people languish in abject poverty, barely managing to scrape by. Although there has been some progress toward debunking the stereotype of slum dwellers as lazy, criminal, and somewhat ignorant, there is still an overall perception that people who live in informal settlements are different, not like the rest of society and hence not quite able to get ahead in life. Read more or join the discussion.
Every year thousands of rural migrants stream to Nairobi slums in search of economic opportunities from which they are excluded back home. Recent studies have shown that the majority of slum dwellers are not born in Nairobi, but have come from rural areas to explore the city’s livelihood opportunities during their early adult years. When it comes to services for these new arrivals, it seems safe to say that there is no such thing. New arrivals are at the lowest rung of the economic chain and must rely on their own ingenuity, entrepreneurial spirit, and (importantly) family networks in order to get ahead. Read more or join the discussion.
On the 4th of March this year, the day Kenyans went to the polls to elect their fourth president, a large part of the mainstream media covering the elections was stationed in Kibera slum, ready to capture any violence that might erupt. At the end of the day, the general impression was that reporters had been disappointed that Kiberans had patiently spent hours on end in long winding queues as they waited for their turn to vote. “I had so many calls just before the election,” Josh Owino, a coordinator for Kibera News Network (KNN), tells us. “International journalists contacted me because they wanted to do stories on how Kiberans were migrating out of the slums to avoid violence; they also wanted me to track down perpetrators from the 2008 post-election violence so they could get direct testimonies from them.” Read more or join the discussion.
On the 27th of May 2012, the Kenyan LGBT news agency Identity reported that two men were caught having sex in the night in Kayole, a north Nairobi slum. According to the article, the men were attacked and stoned. One of them got away, but the other succumbed to his injuries; his body was later found at a dumpsite near where he had been caught. The incident highlights a difficult reality for Men who have Sex with Men (MSM) living in Nairobi slums. Sleeping in cramped quarters, with privacy a luxury that few can afford, and forced to conceal their sexual identity for fear of repercussions, MSM hide in the shadows and often lack access to the medical services the rest of the population enjoys. Read more or join the discussion.
In a country in which government planning is glaringly absent from its sprawling shantytowns, it takes external actors to tackle some of the infrastructure needs of these underserved locations. Private companies on their own do not generally enter into a slum-upgrading program unless given a concrete incentive to do so. That said, private investment in slums is not uncommon: it is a recognised fact that the small-scale purchasing power of individual slum dwellers really adds up when it is multiplied by the hundreds of thousands of souls that can inhabit an informal settlement. Enter Esther Passaris, part Greek, part Kenyan, brought up in the coastal city of Mombasa, who has spent the better part of a decade harnessing the power of Kenya’s businesses to create projects with a positive social impact. Read more or join the discussion.
Lack of access to clean water is one of the greatest causes of ill-health and disease in over-populated informal settlements. More often than not, people find themselves paying over the odds prices for water that has been contaminated by waste and raw sewage that run perilously close to the pipelines for domestic-use. In Nairobi, some people take time to boil water in order to sanitize it, but many just drink it as it is, believing that it is not their problem and that they have more important things to worry about. A project that has been test-run over the last couple of years in Kibera, spearheaded by a Swiss aquatic research company called Eawag, tries to address this situation by providing an affordable solution for water sanitization. Read more or join the discussion.
Homelessness in Nairobi is not always apparent to the passer-by. By night the streets of central town are not full of people sleeping rough as is often the case in affluent “developed” cities. Even in slums, homelessness is quite contained, with people cramming into tiny huts but not on the beaten paths outside. There is, however, one part of the population that makes a living in the shadows of Nairobi’s streets. These are youth, constantly on the run from the police, many of whom make a bed for themselves when night falls wherever they can. Read more or join the discussion.
Typically, children in slums are depicted as having few opportunities to break free from the cycle of poverty into which they are born. It’s a common assumption that slum kids spend their time working menial jobs, don’t go to school, engage in petty crime, and depend largely on charity. Little attention is directed to the real game-changers: those born and brought up in the slum who have made it their lifelong mission to support children who cannot afford to go to school and have no way to pass their days productively. This week we’re describing a day in the life of Tina Turner Warimu — a child who, with the help of one such mentor and her own determination, has begun to pave the road toward a bright future. Read more or join the discussion.
The importance of empowering women goes beyond giving them a means to sustenance and income. It is fundamental to building the fabric of society. A successful woman who is a productive member of society is more likely to create a strong community both in her home and her society. According to CARE, women and girls suffer disproportionately from the burden of extreme poverty, and make up 70 percent of the 1 billion people living on less than a dollar a day. Read more or join the discussion.
Kawasan Rumah Pangan Lestari (KRPL) Kelurahan Tengah berlokasi tak jauh dari Pasar Induk Kramat Jati. Tepatnya di pemukiman padat penduduk, RT 06/RW 10 Kelurahan Tengah, Kecamatan Kramat Jati, Jakarta Timur. Di lahan yang tidak terlalu luas, tumbuh berbagai macam tanaman pangan maupun tanaman obat. Sebagian besar perempuan di wilayah itu bekerja sebagai pengupas bawang merah. Bawang merah yang sudah dikupas harganya lebih mahal, mereka kemudian menjualnya di Pasar Induk Kramat Jati. Baca lebih lanjut atau bergabung dalam diskusi.