India shifting to urban centres - The Hindu

Aarti Dhar

NEW DELHI: Fifty per cent of India’s population is expected to be urban-based by 2030. This projection takes into account an expected 8 and 9 per cent growth rate of the population over the next decade and anticipated shifts from agricultural to non-agricultural occupations and from rural to non-rural employment, according to a report, India: Urban Poverty Report 2009.

The report was released on Tuesday by Housing and Urban Poverty Alleviation Minister Kumari Selja.

The United Nations’ projection of the urban population percentage is 40 for the same year.

Urban Poverty Report 2009, brought out with the aid of the United Nations Development Programme and academicians, draws attention to two aspects. One relates to a clear trend, especially apparent in the last two decades, of urban workers being increasingly pushed into the informal sector, even as space for informal economies in towns and cities shrinks. In the informal sector, the profile of work in urban areas has moved from casual employment to self-employment.

The second aspect concerns minimal amenities, a near-absence of rights to land and livelihood, and the higher cost the poor have to incur on transportation and travel to the workplace. Both trends stand to undermine progress towards the Eleventh Five Year Plan goals that focus on “faster and inclusive” growth, the report says.

According to the report, in 2001 an estimated 23.7 per cent of the urban population was living in slums amid squalour, crime, disease and tensions. However, not all slum-dwellers are below the poverty line; they are part of the “other” urban India because of poor city planning and poorer urban land management and legislations.

Basic services

The report focusses on the need to deliver basic services to the urban poor — real or perceived — as a pivotal poverty reduction challenge to be addressed through programmatic focus and proper allocation of funds. This challenge should address not only the present situation but future influx to the cities.

Urban poverty alleviation strategies should be aimed at the poorest and most vulnerable, the report says.

Ms. Selja said the challenge was to provide basic services to the urban poor and slum-dwellers without letting the elite capture all the benefits, and without a subversive protest against sharing of strained city infrastructure resources by those who now own them.