Peri-Urban Livelihood and Adaptive Capacity: Urban Development in Dar-es-Salaam

The research address the interactions between urban development and global environmental change processes as crucial for climate change (CC) impacts reduction. Together with the challenges of rapid urban growth, environmental change impacts will undermine efforts to achieve the sustainable development. UN Habitat has highlighted that human dimension of CC is still neglected in CC debate and that «since climate change impacts will undermine country efforts to achieve the goals of sustainable development, adaptation is needed. This is crucial particularly because climate is already changing and most countries do not have the adaptive capacity to respond or be prepared to face the climate change impact on cities, settlements and on livelihoods.» (UN Habitat, 2008). The vulnerability to climate change of peri-urban areas is a key issue for scholars engaged in the search for effective strategies and measures to enhance urban adaptive capacity in Least Developed. Peri-urban areas in those countries contain mainly informal settlements and are home to a substantial and growing proportion of the world’s urban population. Peri-urban livelihoods depend partly on natural resources such as land, water and space for living (Brook and Davila, 2000). This is also what makes them vulnerable to environmental changes and thus a priority area for improvements in adaptation and consequently in sustainability. It is widely argued that improved urban planning and provision of public services and infrastructure are crucial for both development and the promotion of sustainability. There is a broad consensus that betterment of housing conditions and provision of modern infrastructures are the best ways to reduce environmental risk and vulnerability to environmental change in unplanned settlements (UN Habitat, 2003). Based on findings from fieldwork carried out in Dar es Salaam, the paper discusses the livelihood strategies, autonomous adaptation and environmental management practices in peri-urban areas, as they are crucial factors in adaptive capacity at the local level. The study illustrates how environmental changes can impact the livelihood sustainability of people living in peri-urban areas, and how autonomous adaptation practices seek to avoid or mitigate, environmental threats. Here “autonomous” refers to actions that can be undertaken without the intervention of institutions. The analysis of the empirical data collected in Dar es Salaam shows that rural-urban interactions are crucial for livelihood maintenance in a changing environment, due to their economic, social and environmental relevance. Furthermore households have developed multiple adaptation strategies and environmental management practices to cope with environmental threats, but these activities are still neglected in vulnerability assessment and adaptation planning . As a result, a need arises for better understanding of the autonomous practices taking place in peri-urban areas and of strategies for integrating those practices in adaptation planning at the local level. Adaptive capacity in peri-urban areas is strictly linked with rural-urban relations and livelihoods: land for farming and other activities, the possibility of reusing waste materials, variety of sources of water supply, etc. To pay no attention to those dynamics (and opportunities) could damage people’s livelihoods and compromise their assets. For this reason an improved understanding on how and to what extent urban development effects peri-urban environments and people’s practices is crucial in designing effective local adaptation plans and improving local adaptation capacity.