Dhaka: Improving Living Conditions for the Urban Poor

158 Pages·2007·0.78 MB·English

Dhaka: Improving Living Conditions for the
Urban Poor
Bangladesh Development Series
Paper No. 17
The World Bank Office, Dhaka
June 2007
www.worldbank.org.bd/bds
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Front cover (from left): Michael Foley, Erwin De Nys
Back cover (from left): Andrew Biraj, Erwin De Nys
CURRENCY EQUIVALENTS
Taka (Tk.)
US$1 = Tk. 69.03 (June, 2007)
GOVERNMENT'S FISCAL YEAR
July 1 – June 30
ABBREVIATIONS AND ACRONYMS
ACHR Asian Coalition of Housing Rights MFA Multi-Fibre Arrangement
ADB Asian Development Bank MLGRD Ministry of Local Government and
BBS Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics Rural Development
BELA Bangladesh Environmental Lawyers NGO Non Government Organization
Association NUK Nari Uddyog Kendra
BLAST Bangladesh Legal Aid and Services Trust PPP Purchasing Power Parity
BRAC Bangladesh Rural Advancement OECD Organization of Economic
Committee Cooperation and Development
CIRDAP Centre on Integrated Rural Development RAB Rapid Action Batallion
for Asia and the Pacific RAJUK Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha
COHRE Centre for Housing Rights and Evictions RCA Revealed Comparative Advantage
CPTED Crime Prevention Through Environmental RMG Readymade Garment
Design SMA Statistical Metropolitan Area
CUP Coalition for the Urban Poor TK Taka
CUS Centre for Urban Studies UNDP United Nations Development
DCC Dhaka City Corporation Programme
DESA Dhaka Electricity Supply Authority UNFPA United Nations Family Planning
DFID Department for International Development Programme
DMA Dhaka Metropolitan Area UNICEF United Children’s Fund
DMDP Dhaka Metropolitan Development Plan USSP Union for the Scientific Study of
DWASA Dhaka Water and Sewerage Authority Population
EBA Everything But Arms WASA Water and Sewage Authority
EU European Union WHO World Health Organization
FFE Food for Education WTO World Trade Orgnanization
GDP Gross Domestic Product
GTAP Global Trade Analysis Project
HIES Household Income and Expenditure
Survey
IDB Inter-American Development Bank
IFPRI International Food Policy Research
Institute
ILO International Labor Organization
LAC Latin America and Caribbean
LFS Labor Force Survey
LGED Local Government Engineering
Department
Vice President: Praful Patel, SARVP
Country Director: Xian Zhu, SACBD
Sector Director: Constance Bernard, SASSD
Sector Manager: Sonia Hammam, SASSD
Task Leader: Judy L. Baker, FEU
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Table of Contents
Preface and Acknowledgements ..................................................................................... ix
Foreword........................................................................................................................... xi
Executive Summary....................................................................................................... xiii
Chapter 1: A Poverty Profile for Dhaka........................................................................ 1
I. Introduction ................................................................................................................ 1
II. Poverty and Inequality in Dhaka................................................................................ 2
III. Characteristics of the poor ........................................................................................ 6
IV. Perceptions of Poverty.............................................................................................. 9
Chapter 2: Employment and Poverty .......................................................................... 13
I. Introduction .............................................................................................................. 13
II. General Characteristics of the Labor Force in Dhaka .............................................. 13
III. Employment and the Poor....................................................................................... 14
A. General characteristics ....................................................................................... 15
B. Employment Sector and Occupation ................................................................... 16
C. Gender, employment and poverty........................................................................ 19
D. Participation of children in the labor force ........................................................ 20
E. Working hours and income.................................................................................. 21
F. Un- and underemployment .................................................................................. 21
IV. Prospects for Employment Generation and Policy Recommendations .................. 22
A. Trends and prospects on the supply side of Dhaka’s labor market .................... 22
B. Trends and prospects on the demand side of Dhaka’s labor market .................. 27
V. Improving income earning opportunities for the poor ............................................ 31
Chapter 3: Shelter for the Poor .................................................................................... 33
I. Background............................................................................................................... 33
A. A Fast Growing, Poor Megacity ......................................................................... 33
B. High Land Prices Have Excluded the Poor from Ownership of Land and
Housing................................................................................................................ 35
II. Main policy constraints ............................................................................................ 37
A. Unresponsiveness to price signals for a large portion of the land in the city..... 37
B. An enabling housing policy without enablers ..................................................... 39
C. Failures of coordination and services at the local level ..................................... 44
D. The limited role of NGOs in housing for urban poor ......................................... 45
III. Improving Shelter Conditions for the Urban Poor.................................................. 46
Chapter 4: The Challenges of Service Delivery for Dhaka’s Poor............................ 51
I. The Current Situation ............................................................................................... 51
A. Basic Services...................................................................................................... 52
B. Service Providers................................................................................................. 53
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II. Constraints to Service Delivery................................................................................ 56
A. Lack of government policy.................................................................................... 56
B. Evictions of slum residents .................................................................................. 56
C. The Pervasive Role of Mastaans ......................................................................... 57
D. Other constraints................................................................................................. 57
III. Improving Service Delivery for the Urban Poor..................................................... 59
Chapter 5: Crime and Violence and the Urban Poor................................................. 62
I. Background and Introduction .................................................................................... 63
II. Manifestations of crime and violence affecting the urban poor in Dhaka ............... 64
A. Main Survey Findings.......................................................................................... 65
III. Relationship between crime and violence and social, institutional, and legal issues
....................................................................................................................................... 72
IV. Addressing Crime and Violence............................................................................. 74
Specific recommendations for crime and violence prevention in Dhaka ................. 75
References........................................................................................................................ 83
List of Boxes
Box 2.1: The “missing” women in the poor income groups............................................ 18
Box 2.2: Post MFA and entry of China in the WTO, their impact on the poor in Dhaka?
A summary of the literature .............................................................................................. 29
Box 3.1: Slum Improvement/Upgrading Programs of the National Government ............ 43
Box 3.2: NGO programs targeted to poor renters............................................................. 46
Box 4.1: Making Things Work in Health Care................................................................ 55
Box 4. 2: Case Study from CUS: Slum Eviction in Agargaon ....................................... 57
Box 4.3: Making Things Work in Water and Sanitation ................................................. 58
Box 4.4: Case Study: Lessons Learned from DSK’s Water Delivery Project in
Conjunction with DWASA............................................................................................... 61
Box 5.1: Community Police Stations in Mumbai’s slum. ................................................ 80
Box 5.2: Crime and Violence Prevention Components in Bank-financed Integrated Slum
Upgrading Operations:...................................................................................................... 81
List of Tables
Table 1.1: Slums covered in the Aparajeyo Survey............................................................ 2
Table 1.2: Characteristics of the poor in Dhaka. ............................................................... 6
Table 1.3: Distance to Public Services for Slum Dwellers (in meters) ............................. 8
Table 1.4: Percentage of total (monthly) household expenditure in Tak as
for Dhaka SMA.................................................................................................. 9
Table 2.1: Employment Characteristics of Households by Income Group ...................... 16
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Table 2.2: Sectoral distribution of the male workers in Dhaka SMA by income group (in
percentage)........................................................................................................................ 17
Table 2.3: Main Jobs of Male Workers in Dhaka............................................................. 17
Table 2.4: Sectoral distribution of female workers in Dhaka SMA by income group (in
percentage)........................................................................................................................ 18
Table 2.5: Main Jobs of Poor Female Workers ................................................................ 19
Table 2.6: Hours and wages of the poor, by occupation and gender ................................ 21
Table 2.7: Unemployment and Underemployment in Dhaka SMA by Income Group .... 22
Table 2.8: Comparison of Average Monthly Wages between Dhaka and Rural Areas in
2000 (in Taka)................................................................................................................... 24
Table 3.1: Urban Population and Poor Population in DCC and DMDP........................... 34
Table 3.2: Housing Tenure of the Urban Poor, 1995........................................................ 36
Table 3.3: Relative importance of Housing Delivery Sub-Sectors in Dhaka ................... 39
Table 4.1: Administrative structure of service delivery in Dhaka .................................... 54
Table 5.1: Percentage of Respondents affected by crime and violence........................... 66
Table 5.2: Nature of Crime and Violence Occur in the Slums (Multi-response) ............. 66
Table 5.3: The Severity of Crime and Violence (Multi-response). .................................. 67
Table 5.4: Respondent’s recommendation regarding combating existing Crime and
Violence (Multi-response). ............................................................................................... 71
Table 5.5: Linking urban spatial and non-spatial interventions: The KfW/ City of Cape
Town Khayelitsha Violence Prevention through Urban Upgrading Project .................... 79
List of Figures
Figure 1.1: Slum Formation in the DCC Area, 2005......................................................... 4
Figure 1.2: Slum Ownership, Dhaka, 2005........................................................................ 5
Figure 1.3: Image of flood slums in flood zone, Dhaka .................................................... 5
Figure 1.4: Access to Public Toilets .................................................................................. 7
Figure 3.1: Map of Land Use in Dhaka City, 1984 .......................................................... 40
Figure 3.2: Map of Land Use in Dhaka City, 2004 .......................................................... 41
List of Annexes
Annex 1: Poverty Profile Background Tables and Figures ............................................. 97
Annex 2: Supplemental Data on Labor........................................................................... 101
Annex 3: Supplemental Information on Land and Housing ........................................... 125
Annex 4: Supplemental Data on Crime and Violence ................................................... 133
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PREFACE AND ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This report was prepared by a team led by Judy L. Baker (World Bank, FEU).
Team members who participated in the field work and contributed background papers
commissioned for this report include: Nazrul Islam, (University of Dhaka and Centre for
Urban Studies), “Dhaka Land and Housing”, Somik Lall, (World Bank, DECRG), “A
Poverty Profile for Dhaka”; David Le Blanc and Robert Buckley (World Bank, TUDUR),
“Dhaka Urban Poverty: Land and Housing Issues”; Bernice Van Bronkhurst (World
Bank, LAC Region), “Crime and Violence”, Sabina Faiz Rashid (BRAC University) and
Yasmeen Hossain (London School of Economics), “Constraints to Delivering Services to
the Urban Poor Living in Slums in Dhaka, Bangladesh”, Claire Salmon, (University of
Savoie, France), “The Situation of the Poor in the Working Population of Dhaka.” This
study also drew on independent work carried out by Rashid and Mannan, 2004, “The
Heterogeneity of the Urban Poor: Political-Economy and Social Conditions in Urban
Slums” and Aparajeyo, 2002 “Slum Observatory Survey.”
Surveys that were commissioned for this study were carried out by Aparajeyo
(Crime and Violence), and the Local Government Engineering Department (LGED),
(Spatial Poverty Mapping of the Dhaka Metropolitan Area). Data analysis was done by
Asha Sundaram and Jonny Anderson. The Coalition for the Urban Poor (CUP) assisted
greatly in organizing meetings with its members and with local communities.
The work was carried out under the guidance of Sonia Hammam, Sector
Manager, (SASEI) and Christine I. Wallich, then Country Director for Bangladesh. The
team benefited from comments from the two peer reviewers, Christine Kessides and
Hassan Zaman, as well as from Patricia Annez, Enrique Pantoja, Jaehyang So, Catherine
Tovey, and Nilufar Ahmed. The report was produced by Erwin De Nys and Aniqah J.
Khan. The report also benefited greatly from the inputs received from participants at the
Consultation Workshop which discussed the findings of the report extensively on
February 14 and 16, 2006.
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