Programme Areas: Urban Policies
Problem Statement
The world's urban population has more than doubled in the past 30 years. In 2008, for the first time in history, the majority of the world’s population lived in urban areas. In the global South, this rapid urbanisation has not been accompanied by industrialisation with the urban poor largely surviving through work in the informal economy. An estimated 1 in every 3 people living in cities of the developing world lives without access to adequate shelter, water and sanitation – in a slum. Yet city governments, pre-occupied with competing for foreign investment and ‘world class city’ status, largely neglect informal workers and slum dwellers, and often actively evict them.
Reducing urban poverty requires reversing this exclusionary trend. What is called for is a fundamental rethinking and reshaping of urban priorities, plans, regulations, and policies to incorporate the working poor. The informal economy needs to be recognised as part-and-parcel of the economy of towns and cities of the developing world. Urban authorities must allow street vendors, hawkers, small kiosks and shops to exist alongside large retail shops and malls; must incorporate waste pickers into modern solid waste management systems; and must support home-based production through basic infrastructure and appropriate zoning policies. There is an urgent need to provide basic services – access to water, sanitation and shelter to the urban poor, especially for those whose home doubles as a work place.
What is required, in brief, is to prioritise infrastructure delivery to the poor and an inclusive approach to urban zoning; urban regulations and laws; and urban plans and policies. This, in turn, will call for inclusive urban planning processes in which representatives of the working poor have a voice in policy-making. There are however conceptual, institutional and resource barriers to securing this alternative vision for cities.
Medium and Long-Term Goals
The Urban Policies Programme of WIEGO seeks to enhance the capacity of the working poor, especially women, in the urban informal economy to shape the urban policies and environment in which they live and work by having increased organizational strength, representative voice, and official visibility.
For cities to be accountable to the needs of the working poor in the urban informal economy, especially women who are concentrated in the segments of informal employment with lowest earnings and highest risks, three enabling conditions are essential:
Voice – Organization of the urban working poor, especially women, into membership-based organizations accountable to their members and representation of these organizations in relevant policy-making and rule-setting institutions.
Visibility – Official recognition of the economic contribution of the urban working poor, especially women, through improved labour force and other economic statistics, as well as in policy research.
Validity – Legal identity and recognition of the urban working poor, especially women, and their membership-based organizations.
WIEGO’s Urban Policies Programme is designed to build and promote these enabling conditions for three sub-sectors of the urban informal workforce: home-based workers, street vendors, and waste pickers. This is with a view to achieving secure and improved living and working environments.
Current Activities
In October 2008 WIEGO alongside the Self Employed Women’s Association, StreetNet International, HomeNet South and South-East Asia, and the waste picker movement in Latin America supported by the Avina Foundation launched a global programme called Inclusive Cities for the Urban Working Poor.
WIEGO’s Urban Policies Programme for developing and implementing a joint research agenda. The joint research content of the Inclusive Cities programme is currently concentrating on the following:
- Assessing the impact of the global economic crisis on the informal economy – In mid 2009 focus group interviews were conducted with informal workers in 10 developing countries to assess the impact of the crisis on the working poor. This resulted in ‘No Cushion to Fall Back On: The Global Economic Crisis and Informal Workers.' The findings of this study were cited in United Nations General Secretary’s report ‘Voices of the Vulnerable: The Economic Crisis from the Ground Up.’ The next round of the study is currently underway.
- Statistical profiles of the urban informal economy – Improved statistics are critical to the visibility of urban informal work. Data analysis in twelve countries will be completed by March 2011. This work, using in most cases national data sets, aims to profile the contribution of urban informal work both country wide and then in specific cities. This research will also entail methodological reflections on how best to capture the urban informal economy.
- Policy and organization analysis – Documentation of how the working poor experience urban policies and planning processes, approaches to infrastructure and service delivery programmes and their organizations. Particular attention is being paid to identifying and disseminating policy approaches and organizational practise that have resulted in securer livelihoods. This aims to strengthen organizations of informal workers and their voice in policy making processes.
- Informal economy budget analysis – analysis of budget allocations for informal workers has been conducted in Brazil, Peru, Pakistan and the Philippines. Each case focused on one city, and two or three types of informal workers. Interrogating budget allocations is a powerful policy analysis tool. Each case concluded with a policy dialogue. This work aims to strengthen the voice of informal workers in policy deliberations and is likely to be replicated in other countries.
- Legislative analysis – An observatory of laws and policies that shape the environment that the urban working poor operate in is currently being constructed. This will reflect the status quo, but special attention is being paid to laws that have result in securer livelihoods for informal workers. This runs in parallel with the in-depth country studies (see organization and representation). This aims to strengthen the legal position – validity – of informal workers. (To participate in this process, request access at https://lawandtheworkingpoor.pbworks.com/request_access.php.)
- Assessing the impact of mega events – Mega events are often the source of exclusionary urban planning practices. In 2010 South Africa hosts the Soccer World Cup and Delhi hosts the Commonwealth Games. Monitoring systems are in place to assess the impact of these events on the working poor. This aims to support StreetNet’s World Class Cities for All Campaign.
Research commissioned under this programme is disseminated through the WIEGO / Inclusive Cities research report series and briefing note series.
Past Activities and Accomplishments
A major focus of WIEGO’s urban policies work historically has been street vendors. WIEGO has completed a set of comparative research projects on the status of street vendors and street vendor associations in the context of the urban regulatory environment; followed by a set of local, national, and international policy dialogues to disseminate the findings and lessons from these studies.
WIEGO’s first two country-level studies on street vendors and urban policies were carried out in Kenya and South Africa 1998-1999 (with support from IDRC). Winnie Mitullah worked on the Kenyan case study; Francie Lund and Caroline Skinner on the South African case. A second set of country studies, modelled on the first, were carried out in four other African countries: Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Uganda, and Zimbabwe from 2000-2002 (with support from the IDRC and the Rockefeller Foundation). Winnie Mitullah, Director of WIEGO’s Urban Policies Programme at the time, coordinated this work.
The studies, in each of the six countries, estimated the numbers of street vendors and studied the working conditions of street vendors, the level and nature of organizing among street vendors, the policy and regulatory environment within which street vendors operate, and the degree/nature of street vendor participation in policy dialogues at local, national, and regional levels.
Winnie Mitullah’s research process resulted in a number of policy dialogues and played a key role in the formation of the Kenyan National Alliance of Street Vendors and Informal Traders (KENASVIT). Soon after the completion of the South African case, Francie Lund and Caroline Skinner were approached by the municipality in Durban to assist in developing an informal economy policy. After a year long policy development process, the city adopted the Informal Economy Policy (downloadable link). A similar process was initiated in the Province of KwaZulu-Natal which resulted in the Informal Economy Green Paper (downloadable link). This still has not been adopted as official policy.
In 1999, WIEGO and SEWA promoted a study of street vending in seven cities in India conducted by Sharit Bhowmik on behalf of the National Association of Street Vendors of India. The findings were presented to the Ministry of Urban Development and Poverty Alleviation in the National Workshop on Hawkers / Street Vendors organized jointly by the Ministry and SEWA at Delhi on 30-31 May 2001. The Ministry later announced the formation of a National Taskforce for Street Vendors. In 2004 after a policy development process, the Indian Government adopted the National Policy for Urban Street Vendors (download the pdf document - 17 MB). This is an international precedent.
With support from WIEGO, Sharit Bhomwik has completed an edited volume on street trading - Street Vendors in the Global Urban Economy. It is published by Routledge in India.
WIEGO has also completed a series of regional literature reviews on street trade:
- Skinner, Caroline, 2008. “Street Trade in Africa: A Review.” School of Development Studies Working Paper No. 51. Durban: University of KwaZulu-Natal.
- Roever, Sally. 2006. "Street Trade in Latin America: Demographic Trends, Legal Issues, and Vending Organizations in Six Cities." A Review Commissioned by WIEGO.
- Bhowmik, Sharit K. 2005. Street Vendors in Asia: A Review. Economic and Political Weekly, 28 May- 4 June.
- Mitullah, Winnie. 2004. A Review of Street Trade in Africa. Unpublished manuscript. Cambridge, MA: WIEGO.
WIEGO has also supported Caroline Skinner and Richard Dobson in documenting the lessons learned from the Warwick Junction, an award winning case of including street traders in urban plans the inner city of Durban, South Africa. Working in Warwick – a book and photographic exhibition was launched in Durban in June 2009. Given the City’s announcement in February 2009 that it will build a large shopping mall in the area, the book and exhibit have become advocacy tools. (For more information see www.workinginwarwick.co.za).
Project Reports and Related Publications (in reverse chronological order):
Bhowmik, S. (ed.) 2009. Street Vendors in the Global Urban Economy Routledge, New Delhi.
Dobson, R. and Skinner, C. 2009. Working in Warwick: Integrating Street Traders into Urban Plans. Durban: University of KwaZulu-Natal.
Skinner, C. 2008. ‘The Struggle for the Streets: Processes of Exclusion and Inclusion of Street Traders in Durban, South Africa’, Development Southern Africa, Vol. 25 No. 2.
Lund F. and Skinner C. 2004. ‘Integrating the Informal Economy in Urban Planning and Governance: A Case Study of the Process of Policy Development in Durban, South Africa.’ International Development Planning Review. Vol.26, No. 4, 431-456.
Lund , Francie and Caroline Skinner. 2003. "The Investment Climate for the Informal Economy: A Case of Durban , South Africa". Background Case Study for World Development Report 2005: A Better Investment Climate for Everyone.
Mitullah, Winnie. 2003. "Street Trade in Kenya: The Contribution of Research in Policy Dialogue and Response." Paper for panel entitled "Urban Responses to Street Traders: A Comparative Perspective from India, Kenya, and South Africa" at the Urban Research Symposium on Urban Development for Economic Growth and Poverty Reduction, World Bank, Washington, D.C., December 2003.
Bhowmik, Sharit K. 2003. "Urban Responses to Street Trading: India." Paper for Panel entitled "Urban Responses to Street Traders: A Comparative Perspective from India, Kenya, and South Africa" at the Urban Research Symposium on Urban Developmetn for Economic Growth and Poverty Reduction, World Bank, Washington, D.C., December 2003.
Lund , Francie. 2003. "People Working Informally: Negotiating the Use of Public Spaces in Durban City." Paper for Panel entitled "Urban Responses to Street Traders: A Comparative Perspective from India, Kenya, and South Africa" at the Urban Research Symposium on Urban Developmetn for Economic Growth and Poverty Reduction, World Bank, Washington, D.C., December 2003.
Mitullah, Winnie. 2003. "Street Vending in African Cities: A Synthesis of Empirical Findings from Kenya , Cote D'Ivoire , Ghana , Zimbabwe , Uganda and South Africa". Background Case Study for World Development Report 2005: A Better Investment Climate for Everyone.
Skinner C. 2000. ‘Getting Institutions Right? Local Government and Street Traders in Four South African Cities’ Urban Forum, Vol. 11, No. 1, 51-71.
Alila, P., Mittulah, W. and Kamau, A. 2000. Policies, Regulations and Organizational Capicity of Women Street Vendors in Kenya, IDS Discussion Paper Number 299. Nairobi: University of Nairobi.
Bhowmik, Sharit K. 1999. "Hawkers and the Urban Informal Sector: A Study of Street Vending in Seven Cities". Prepared for the National Alliance of Street Vendors of India.
Lund F. and Skinner C. 1999. Promoting the Interests of Women Street Traders: An Analysis of Organizations in South Africa. CSDS Research Report No 19. Durban: University of Natal.
Skinner C. 1999. Local Government in Transition - A Gendered Analysis of Trends in Urban Policy and Practice Regarding Street Trading in Five South African Cities. CSDS Research Report No 18. Durban: University of Natal.
Lund F. 1998. Women Street Traders in Urban South Africa: A Synthesis of Selected Research Findings. CSDS Research Report No 15. Durban: University of Natal.