Unemployment Major Cause of Urbanisation

Tunomukwathi Asino

3 June 2011

Windhoek — The introduction of subsidies for rural housing schemes and intensified civic education at regional level could curb the mushrooming of shacks in urban areas, a study has found.

A research paper by Dr Andrew Niikondo, Head of the Public Management Department at the Polytechnic of Namibia, has identified unemployment as a major cause of urbanisation in Namibia.

It has also established that unemployment and poverty are not the only variables that influence people to live in shacks.

The academic report titled “Migrants to Ci-ties and Towns in Namibia: The Dynamics of Investing in Urban Versus Rural Areas” was recently launched at Polytechnic of Namibia.

The study found that the increase in the number of shacks in Windhoek is influenced by additional factors such as low-income levels, lack of interest in urban investment, lack of proper understanding of the urban situation, exorbitant prices of land, especially in Windhoek, and lack of Government support.

It recommends that subsidies for rural housing schemes be introduced, and that civic education at regional level be intensified.

A survey was conducted on the informal settlements of Havana, Ombili and Okahandja Park near Windhoek.

The study investigated whether the rural-urban migrants’ economic status ties to their rural traditional houses and families. It also investigated whether the financial and other support sent back to their rural homes, influence their interest and ability to spend in urban properties and hence cause them to opt to dwell in a shack as an alternative.

The paper found that immigrants to the City of Windhoek who are older than 35 years, and who have a fairly low level of education, and have an interest in their rural homes, would be prone to feel like transient of the city rather than as residents.

“Consequently, they are less likely to take responsibility for their surroundings, including buying formal houses, and instead more likely to erect shacks either legally or illegally on the peripheries of towns in Namibia,” says the paper.

The paper suggests that central government initiates subsidies for municipal lands to reduce prices of properties so that poor people can also afford them.

It also recommends that central government as well as local municipalities build apartments for people to rent at reasonable rates, as most people, particularly the young, would prefer to live in such apartments. This strategy, the study says, would in turn lead to a decrease in shacks in the urban areas of Namibia.

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