Urban Poverty & Climate Change in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania:

change, so that they could formulate and implement adaptation measures; (ii) upgraded
infrastructure such as roads, water supply, electricity and bridges; (iii) construction of
drainage channels for storm and wastewater; and (iv) planting trees and punishment for those
who cut them.
Residents were also in favor of stricter controls of polluting industries and of private entities
engaged in haphazard construction in the settlements, and were unhappy about the
construction of structures over stormwater drains by investors and other residents, which
block drains and cause flooding. Lastly, they complained of some people illegally occupying
public land and thus reducing public space for common activities (such as open marketplaces
and playgrounds).
Encourage a long-term planning horizon
Climate change cuts across issues of poverty, health, environmental degradation,
infrastructure design, land management and zoning, and flooding and disaster risk
management. The most effective form of adaptation for Dar es Salaam’s poor residents will
be to plan in a way that addresses their urgent needs for now and in times to come, given
expected future impacts of climate change. Addressing basic needs that are currently not
being met adequately (e.g., clean water supply, secure housing, adequate drainage and
sanitation infrastructure) will reduce the poor’s vulnerability and reduce their ‘adaptation
deficit’ (inability to cope with current conditions, including climate variability). The city’s
planners, engineers, and health officials, however, need to consider a long-term perspective in
siting and designing new infrastructure, projecting demand and supply for services,
projecting disease distribution, etc., given that climate change has the potential to impact
profoundly on such factors. Thus projections for changes in rainfall intensity, for example,
should be taken into account when planning stormwater drainage lines that are expected to
last several decades. When constructing water reservoirs, decisions on surface area should
consider possible increase in future evaporation rates.
6.2 Key lessons emerging from analysis conducted thus far
• Rapid unplanned urbanization in Dar es Salaam has led to flood risk in many informal
settlements, with a wide range of associated health and other problems for residents;
• Disaster risk management has largely been ignored and needs to be integrated in all aspects of
urban planning in Dar es Salaam;
• The ecological and hydrological role of wetlands needs to be understood and accounted for in
urban development (despite being labeled ‘hazard land’, permits for commercial development on
Hazard Lands were occasionally given in the past, fuelling development of informal
settlements);
• The sustainability of infrastructure development initiatives and their maintenance is poor,
suggesting that alternative approaches are needed. Suggestions include (i) empowering
grassroots legal structures to effect the NEMA and the Land Law; (ii) requiring each resident of
a community upgrading program to sign a contractual agreement not to expand his/her facility to
encroach public land areas, (iii) prohibiting residents of settlement upgrading schemes from
selling their property until about 10 years after development, with selling of the site to be
approved by local authorities. This will reduce wastage of government and donor resources
whereby immediately after an upgrading program (e.g., SUDP or CIUP) new investors move in,
with original occupiers moving once again to wastelands or hazardous areas, exposing
themselves to more risk than before.
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