Business Daily (Nairobi)
Dr Anna Tibaijuka
28 April 2008
Many of the things I learned have served me well in my career back home in Tanzania as economics professor at the University of Dar es Salaam and in my daily work as an executive in the UN system.
There is of course the need to recognize that scarcity is the bane of civilization. Some of the dynamics that are changing our world very rapidly today is the new scarcity of urban space, and hence the urbanization of poverty. There are two mega-trends that are shaping our societies and our daily lives.
These trends are "globalisation" and the "information revolution". However, there is a third mega-trend that is less talked about and perhaps less visible on a daily basis. It is, nonetheless, having an equally important impact on our societies and the way we live. This third megatrend is urbanisation and the growth of cities. In economic parlance we can say, the crisis of the scarcity of living urban space.
The phenomenon of urbanization constitutes a defining feature of the new century and of the new millennium. Today, cities are increasingly assuming a leadership role amid the phenomenon of globalization. With the liberalization of the world's economy, human, technological, financial and informational resources are concentrating in cities.
Cities, therefore, are potent instruments for national economic and social development. They attract investment and create wealth. They enhance social development, harness human and technological resources resulting in unprecedented gains in productivity and competitiveness.
And within this new constellation, cities are serving as the nexus of production, innovation and specialized services, as well as generating new forms of social organization, cultural integration and dialogue among civilizations as the world, assisted by radical innovations in transport and communication technology, becomes a global village and market place. The paradox is that cities have also become a locus of excruciating poverty and deprivation.
This is particularly the case in developing countries. Unless we deconstruct this issue into its causal factors, most of them economic ones, I fear that we will continue to debate the same issues, propose the same solutions, based on the same theoretical constructs. We need to see the urban poor as assets and not liabilities. We need to fight poverty and not the poor, to fight slums and not slum dwellers.
Dr Tibaijuka is the executice director of United Nations Habitat.
Be the first to Write a Comment!
Copyright © 2008 Business Daily. All rights reserved. Distributed by AllAfrica Global Media (allAfrica.com). To contact the copyright holder directly for corrections — or for permission to republish or make other authorized use of this material, click here.
AllAfrica aggregates and indexes content from over 125 African news organizations, plus more than 200 other sources, who are responsible for their own reporting and views. Articles and commentaries that identify allAfrica.com as the publisher are produced or commissioned by AllAfrica.
