ABSTRACT
Burgeoning urban population, decrepit housing structures, massive informal settlements, a large army of unemployed people, oases of wealth – these are the usual images of urban Africa. There is an evident paradox: the cities are generators of a disproportionate share of GDP 1 (more than 55 per cent) in the region 2 (UN-HABITAT, 2008b), but they are simultaneously the breeding grounds of urban poverty. Indeed, the proportion of the urban population officially classified as poor (43 per cent) is similar to the proportion in the rural areas (59 per cent), and sub-Saharan Africa records the world’s highest levels of urban poverty, the rates being greater than 50 per cent in a number of the poorest countries, including Chad, Niger, and Sierra Leone (UN-HABITAT, 2001).
