Third World Cities: Urbanization Trends

Third World Cities: Urbanization Trends
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Third World Cities: Urbanization Trends
Introduction
In several developing countries, urban growth and urbanization has expanded rapidly especially over the last few decades. 37% of the total population across the world lived in cities by 1970. This figure rose to 45% by 1995, and experts estimated that by 2005, it would be over 50% (UN, 1995). Urban populations have been expanding at a high rate, and this includes 3.3% in Northern Africa, 2.5% in the Caribbean and Latin America, 5% in Africa and 4% in Asia. Despite the fact that natural population in several third world cities is a significant contributor to urbanization, another important factor is rural-urban migration (Stephens, 2005). The flow of internal migration tends to be complex, diverse and changes constantly, and this includes rural/urban, urban/rural, rural/rural and urban/urban. Trends of urbanization also depend on the immigrant’s level of education, age, and the permanency of migration.
Income differential between the rural and urban areas is a major factor which determines the rate of urbanization. This is because people living in rural areas which are relatively poorer compared to urban areas tend to migrate in search of a higher income. In addition, since the standards of living in urban areas are high and there is more employment opportunities, rural people tend to migrate to urban areas (Hardoy, Mitlin & Satterthwaite, 1992). There are several factors which affects the economic conditions of rural areas compared to urban areas. For instance, migration tends to be influenced by land ownership, crop prices, diversities in agricultural technologies as well as crop mixes in near and distant areas. Lastly, urbanization also depends on household and individual structures, economic, political and social forces.
Urbanization and housing
Trends of urbanization are highly dependent on the availability of housing in urban areas. People are more likely to move to urban areas if there is availability of housing and it is cost affordable. One basic factor of urban poverty is unavailability safe and secure housing. Close to 600 million people living in urban areas in Africa, Latin America and Asia live in overcrowded and poor quality houses (Wratten, 1995). The rate of urbanization has been so high such that there is inadequate provision of water, drainage, sanitation, garbage collection, thus exposing their lives to high risk (World Urban Forum Bulletin, 2006). Housing is an essential asset when it comes to urbanization since access to credit for investment purposes depends on property ownership. The cost and presence of land for development significantly affects housing prices. In addition, these factors lead to the development of informal and illegal land market such that people have a limited ability to pay.
Gender-specific factors play a major role when it com...