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Programme Areas: Urban Policies*

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Problem Statement

The world population reached 6 billion in 1999 and is estimated to reach 7 billion soon after 2010. A significant proportion of this population increase has been and will be absorbed in urban areas. Thirty years ago, less than 40 per cent of humanity lived in cities or towns. Thirty years from now, over 60 per cent of humanity will live in urban settlements. At present, half of humanity – every second human being – lives in an urban settlement. Much of the expanded urban population has been absorbed in mega-cities with a population of more than 1 million. Twenty years ago, there were 245 mega-cities around the world. Today, there are 375. By the year 2015, an estimated 40 per cent of the world’s urban population will live in mega-cities (UNHABITAT 2006).

In the developing world, these figures are even more dramatic. Urban settlements in developing countries are growing at five times the rate of those in developed countries. And the concentration of urban populations in “million +” cities is particularly significant in developing countries. Thirty years ago, developing and developed countries had roughly the same number of mega-cities. Today, developing countries have twice as many mega-cities as developed countries (UNHABITAT 2006).

There are competing perspectives on this rapid urbanization. On one hand, urbanization is associated with economic and social progress. Towns and cities are seen as “engines of growth and incubators of civilization” (ibid.). Urban settlements, properly managed, are seen to hold the promise for human development and sustainable development (as urban populations are presumed to put less strain on the environment than rural populations). And mega cities now compete among themselves for global or “world class” status. On the other hand, rapid urbanization is associated with economic competition and social friction. Urban populations are often polarized into rich and poor neighborhoods giving rise to homelessness and urban crime. Many urban poor live in informal settlements that lack basic infrastructure – water, electricity, and sanitation (UNHABITAT 2006).

There is little doubt that rapid urbanization has been accompanied by a proliferation of slums and squatter settlements, reflecting a shortage of affordable housing for the urban poor. Over three-quarters of the urban population in the least developed countries and nearly one-third of the urban population of the world is estimated to live in slums or squatter settlements (Davis 2004). Further, it is estimated that around half of urban dwellers in developing countries do not have a safe and protected supply of water; and one-third lack basic sanitation facilities (UNHABITAT 2006).

There have been other major transformations over the past thirty years. While the world’s population has been urbanized and human settlements have been informalized, the world’s labour force too has been urbanized and informalized.

In most of the cities in the developing world the urban poor survive through work in the informal economy. At the same time, these cities attempt a ‘make-over’ by trying to attain the standards of global cities. These transformations invariably involve actions that are directed against the urban poor. Street vendors, garbage pickers and slum dwellers are the frequent targets of measures at “cleaning up” the city in the quest for attaining global standards. The media and the urban elites portray these groups as encroachers and free loaders whose sole objective is to create an unclean environment and usurp facilities meant for the so-called “tax paying” gentry.

WIEGO asserts that the informal economy plays a vital role in the city’s economy. Garbage pickers help in recycling waste and keep the city clean. Yet they are constantly harassed by the municipal officials and “citizens” groups who treat them as petty criminals. Street vendors supply cheap and affordable goods that are consumed by the poor and slums help in providing cheap housing to the working poor. Low priced goods and cheap housing help in reducing labour costs. These aspects are somehow overlooked by urban planners as most plans exclude the working poor from designs. WIEGO does not believe in only criticising the present trends but in attempting in finding solutions. Attempts at integrating the urban poor into the plans need to be discussed. There are cases where garbage pickers are included in the beautification projects and street vendors are conceived as a major initiative for urban poverty alleviation. Slums have been upgraded in order to provide inexpensive housing with basic facilities.

Those who do recognize the urban informal economy tend to subscribe to the notion that informal operators choose to avoid registering their enterprises in order to avoid taxation. Others refer to it as markets for selling illegal goods such as drugs, stolen goods and pirated books, CDs etc. But the reality is more complex. To begin with, the urban informal economy includes not only the self-employed who run small unregulated enterprises but also wage workers in unregulated and unprotected jobs. Also, not all of the self-employed who run small unregistered enterprises are entrepreneurial or seek to avoid registration and taxation nor do they belong to the underworld. Many are own account operators who run very small survivalist activities or very small family businesses. Further, what they would like is to receive the benefits of formal recognition in exchange for the costs of registration.

There are a number of ways in which urban informal workers could – and should – be integrated into urban planning. If they are to pay the costs of registering – both the transaction costs and the taxes – urban informal operators would like some guarantee that they will receive the benefits of formalization. It is important, therefore, to guarantee as many of these benefits as possible to small scale operators. These benefits would include:

  • the right to work
  • the right to a place from which to work
  • legal rights to property
  • the right to public services and infrastructure
  • fair prices and wages
  • fair and legally enforceable commercial transactions
  • fair and legally enforceable employment relations

The following functional areas of urban policies determine who gets which of these benefits:

  • Regulation of public space
  • Regulation of public space
  • Framework for legalizing private property
  • Provision of infrastructure and services:
    • roads, transport, and communication
    • marketing and export promotion
    • water, electricity, and sanitation
  • Regulation of commercial transactions
  • Regulations of employment relations

However, urban planners that promote private sector development and small enterprise development commonly do not understand – or do not even take into account - how to support the kinds of very small businesses that most of the working poor, and especially women, are found in. As a result, the smallest business have little (if any) access to tax breaks and incentive packages to increase competitiveness or membership in trade associations. Also, urban policies or projects to upgrade slums – through the provision of water, electricity, and sanitation services – commonly do not take into account that homes are often workplaces, especially for women informal workers.

Further, it is important to note that many workers in the urban informal economy are not self-employed: they are casual day labourers in construction, wage workers or industrial outworkers in manufacturing, domestic workers and other providers of personal services, or other categories of wage workers with unregulated and unprotected jobs. Too few city planners recognize the role that local government can play in ensuring the right of urban informal wage workers to workers’ rights and benefits, including the right to organize.

Finally, it is important to remember that the working poor in the urban informal economy need representation in the institutions and processes that determine urban policies and related rules and regulations.

Goals

Uban Policies Programme of WIEGO seeks to understand, highlight, and address how different functional areas of urban planning, policies, and regulations affect different categories of urban informal workers. In so doing, it also seeks to understand and highlight the answers to such questions as: What are the conflicting interests that have to be managed in integrating informal workers into city plans in the developing world? And what institutional arrangements and processes would allow these conflicting interests to be managed? And what would an inclusive urban planning process be?

More specifically, the Programme seeks to investigate the “fit” (or lack thereof) between reality on the ground – the situation of different categories of informal workers - and relevant urban policies, laws and regulations. To fulfill these aims, the Programme undertakes three sets of related activities: research, case study documentation, and policy dialogues.

Long-Term Vision

  • critical mass of cities around the world that have adopted a participatory policy process and supportive policy approach in support of different categories of workers in the urban informal economy;
  • integration of an informed understanding of the informal economy in the curriculum and teaching of urban planning departments or courses; and
  • improved statistics on the urban informal economy – its size, composition, and contribution – in a critical mass of cities around the world.

Medium-Term Goals

  • policy analysis and advocacy to encourage cities to adopt a participatory policy process and supportive policy approach to the different categories of workers in the urban informal economy;
  • networking and information exchange between cities that have adopted a supportive policy approach to the urban informal economy; and
  • network of researchers, statisticians, and other technical experts working on how urban policies affect the urban informal economy.

Past Activities and Accomplishments

Street Vendors


The major activity to date of WIEGO’s Urban Policy Programme has been 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.

  1. Comparative Street Vendor Research

    Country Studies in Africa -
    The first two country-level studies on street vendors and urban policies were carried out in South Africa and Kenya in 1998-1999. A second set of country studies, modeled on the first, were carried out in four other African countries: Cote d’Ivoire, Ghana, Uganda, and Zimbabwe from 2000-2002. The research partners involved in these studies are listed below:

    Set # 1: Street Trade in South Africa and Kenya (with support from IDRC)

    • Institute of Development Studies, University of Nairobi, Kenya
    • Self-Employed Women’s Union (SEWU), South Africa
    • School of Development Studies, University of Natal, South Africa
    • The Workers College, South Africa

    Set # 2: Street Trade in Four Other African Countries (with support from the ILO and the Rockefeller Foundation)

    • Centre for Basic Research (CBR), Uganda
    • Kwame Nkurumah University of Science and Technology, Department of Housing Planning Research, Ghana
    • University of Abidjan, Cote d’Ivore
    • Women and Law in Southern Africa Research and Education Trust (WLSA), Zimbabwe

    In her capacity as the (then) Director of WIEGO’s Urban Policies Programme, Winnie Mitullah coordinated the various country studies.

    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. These comparative country studies led to a better understanding of street vendors on a number of dimensions, as follows:

    • classification of street vendors: not only by vending site or by goods sold but also by socio-political features (traditional street vendors, new entrants, immigrant traders, cross-border traders)
    • cost-benefit analysis of informal street vending: costs to street vendors of operating informally, including costs associated with taxes (both indirect and direct), storage and transport, eviction from vending sites, and confiscation of goods; costs to the city of confiscating goods left overnight on site by vendors who cannot afford storage or transport costs of removing them each evening; and contributions of street vendors to local economy, including large share of volume of traded goods and of employment in trade; and distribution of basic consumer goods at relatively low prices at convenient sites for poorer consumer groups
    • regulation versus de-regulation: need for appropriate regulations (not necessarily de-regulation) to govern informal employment and production relations; functions and impacts of different regulatory regimes (urban policies, municipal acts bye-laws, police acts, local trade and industry policies, local tax policies) on informal workers
    • impact of urban policies/regulations: not just on street vending per se but also on the related needs of street vendors for storage, transport, shelter, and other necessary facilities; on different categories of vendors/hawkers/traders; and on other categories of informal workers (e.g., impact of zoning regulations on home-based workers)
    • impact of local government on informal workers both as workers and as citizens: e.g., through policies designed to regulate other features of urban life - e.g., health department regulations, city bye laws, or traffic/transport policies – local government has a direct effect on the working conditions of informal workers, including both home-based workers and those who work in public or open spaces.
    • organization and representation: genesis of organizing (self-organizing, political forces, trade unions, NGOs, others); strategies of organizing, including types of claim-making and collective bargaining and nature of tactics (confrontational/violent vs. non-confrontational/non-violent); relevant forums for representation, including the barriers to translating organization into representation
    • political-economy of street vending/street vendor associations: what gives rise to street vending (traditional livelihoods, loss of manufacturing jobs, migration/immigration); what gives rise to street vendor associations (self-organizing, political parties, trade unions, NGOs); who are the other vested interests (big traders, transport lobby, city planners, different classes of consumers, the police, especially traffic cops) with which street vendors (and their organizations) have to negotiate

    City Studies in India-
    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. The objective of this taskforce was to frame a national policy on street vending.

    World Development Report Case Studies-
    In 2003, WIEGO was commissioned by the World Bank to write three case studies on the investment climate for informal enterprises and workers for the World Development Report 2005: A Better Investment Climate for Everyone. Two of these were on the urban regulatory or investment climate. The first by Winnie Mitullah, who carried out the street trade research in Kenya, was on urban regulation of street traders, pulling together the findings and lessons from the comparative studies in the six African countries. The second by Francie Lund and Caroline Skinner, who carried out the street vendor research in South Africa, was on urban regulation of street traders and garment manufacturers in Durban, South Africa.

    Regional Reviews –
    During 2003, Winnie Mitullah (former Director of WIEGO’s Urban Policies programme) and Sharit Bhowmik (current Director of WIEGO’s Urban Policies programme) carried out regional literature reviews on street trade in, respectively, Africa and Asia.

    Global Picture –
    In 2001, WIEGO was commissioned to write a book compiling and analyzing existing national statistics on the informal workforce – both women and men – around the world. Statistics on street vendors were featured as an illustrative case study in that book entitled Women and Men in the Informal Economy: A Statistical Picture.

  2. Policy Dialogues on Street Trade


    3. Two key research methods – focus group discussions and policy dialogues - used in the comparative country studies on street trade in Africa yielded unexpected dividends. In Durban, South Africa, the initial research relied heavily on focus group discussions with street vendors to get a sense of the problems facing vendors in different sectors. Policy dialogues involving vendors themselves, officials, people from trade unions, and other vested interest groups, were then held in each city, leading up to a national policy dialogue. Once the Durban Task Force was set up, the success of the earlier focus group discussions paved the way for setting up a critical process and methodology for consulting all stakeholders in the Durban central business district. Also, the two researchers at the University of KwaZulu Natal – Francie Lund and Caroline Skinner - who carried out the initial street trade research in South Africa for WIEGO were invited to be lead external consultants to the policy development process.

    In May 2003, Francie Lund and Caroline Skinner spent a month at Harvard University to begin writing a book about the process of policy development for the informal economy in Durban/eThekwini. Their aim is to complete the book by the end of 2006. Meanwhile, they continue to make presentations about this work – including, at the 2003 World Bank Urban Research Symposium, a meeting of the South African Cities Network, the 2004 EGDI-WIDER conference on the informal economy - and have written several articles on the Durban policy process.

    WIEGO and StreetNet International organized a Policy Dialogue between the trade unions and the civic authorities on the last day of StreetNet International’s conference at Seoul, Korea on 18 March 2004. Sharit Bhowmik chaired this dialogue on behalf of WIEGO.

  3. Seminars and Conferences on Street Trade

    Urban Research Symposium, December 2003-
    In December 2003, WIEGO was asked to organize a panel on `Urban Responses to Street Traders: A Comparative Perspective from India, Kenya and South Africa’ at the second World Bank Urban Research Symposium in Washington, D.C. Sharit Bhowmik presented a paper on the India experience, Winnie Mitullah on Kenya, and Francie Lund on South Africa. Winnie Mitullah’s paper was revised for publication by the Intermediate Technology Development Group (ITDG). Marty Chen chaired the panel.

    • 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 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.

Other Categories of Urban Informal Workers

The 2005 Progress of the World’s Women: Women, Work, and Poverty written by a WIEGO team includes brief descriptions with illustrative cases of:

  • urban places of work (Chapter 4)
  • garment workers in Bangladesh, China, and Thailand; street vendors in Kenya; and
  • waste pickers in India (inset to Chapter 4)
  • organizing of urban informal workers (Chapter 5)
  • policy responses to the urban informal economy (Chapter 6)

Home-based Workers: In 2001, as noted above, WIEGO was commissioned to write a book compiling and analyzing existing national statistics on the informal workforce – both women and men – around the world. Statistics on home-based workers were featured as a second illustrative case study in that book entitled Women and Men in the Informal Economy: A Statistical Picture.

Garment Manufacturers: As noted earlier, WIEGO was asked to prepare three case studies on the investment climate for informal enterprises and workers. Two of these were on the urban investment climate. The one on Durban, South Africa, prepared by Francie Lund and Caroline Skinner, dealt with urban regulation of small-scale garment manufacturers as well as street vendors.

 

Organizations of Urban Informal Workers

Through joint action with WIEGO’s Organization and Representation Programme, as well as trade unions and other worker organizations in the WIEGO network, WIEGO’s Urban Policies Programme seeks to help build and strengthen organizations of urban informal workers and networks of such organizations. Together with SEWA of India, WIEGO helped raise funds to establish both the international alliance of street vendor organizations – StreetNet International – and the national association of street vendor organizations in India - the National Association of Street Vendors of India (NASVI).

SEWA and NASVI were instrumental in pressurizing the Ministry of Urban Development, Government of India, to establish the National Taskforce on Street Vendors. Arbind Singh and Sharit Bhowmik of NASVI and Renana Jhabvala of SEWA were members of the six-member Drafting Committee set up by the taskforce for drafting the national policy that was eventually accepted by the Government of India on 20 January 2004.

WIEGO was invited to participate in the Global Online Forum organized by UN-HABITAT JAM on December 1-3, 2005. WIEGO participated in the forum discussion, Humanity: The Future of Our Cities.

Together with SEWA, SWACHH (a national association of waste pickers), and Martin Medina (a Mexican scholar on waste pickers), WIEGO is currently seeking funds to convene an international workshop of waste picker organizations.

 

*Esta página disponible en Español.

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