Bachelor Thesis
Urbanisation as a Mechanism for Efficient and Sustainable
Use of Land
Author: Cecilia Lindholm Supervisor: Heiko Fritz Examiner: Christopher High Term: HT20 Subject: Peace and Development Studies Level: Bachelor Course code: 2FU33E Date of seminar: 14 January 2021
Abstract
Urbanisation in developing countries can contribute to various benefits and challenges. The growing areas of informal settlements on the peripheries of greater cities are a product of rapid urbanisation and uncontrolled population growth of the city. Informal settlements are often accompanied by the expansion of spontaneous and unsustainable infrastructure that encroach on land of valuable, natural resources. The stakeholders of the two locations studied in this research – Accra in Ghana and Kigali in Rwanda – handle stressors that rapid urbanisation causes differently, which is reflected in the use of land beyond the city area. Although a significant amount of research has been done on urbanisation patterns and land use in both Ghana and Rwanda, this study identifies the research gap of how urbanisation can be used and guided by local actors in developing countries for efficient and sustainable land use. The objective of this research is thus to identify how urbanisation can be used and guided for efficient and sustainable land use. The Environmental Stewardship framework by Bennett, et al. (2018) is used to locate relevant aspects of the management of sustainable land use for collecting data. Local authorities and organisations are the responsible actors for the management of land and the urban environment in Ghana and Rwanda respectively. Investigating official documents and reports that can be found on the official websites of these entities, along with UN publications, is therefore the main method of collecting data of this study. One interview, statistical estimates, and articles in local newspapers provide additional data for this study. The findings reveal that local authorities can make use of urbanisation by using several factors for sustainable and efficient land use. These factors include strong leadership and control of land and the urban environment through e.g. the maintenance of land registers, densification and vertical development of dwellings, ensuring the availability of data that allows for land use planning, steering urbanisation to alternative cities through pull-factors, and upgrading informal settlements. The element of capacity, especially institutional capacity, by Bennett, et al. (2018) is found to be profoundly important for efficient and sustainable land use.
Keywords: Land use, sustainable urbanisation, environmental sustainability, spatial planning.
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Table of Contents
List of tables and figures ...... 5 List of abbreviations ...... 6 List of appendices ...... 7 1. Introduction ...... 8 1.1. Research problem, objective, and question ...... 9 1.2. Relevance ...... 10 1.3. Structure ...... 11 2. Literature review ...... 11 3. Analytical framework ...... 15 3.1. Defining the framework ...... 16 3.1.1. Overview ...... 16 3.1.2. Components ...... 17 3.2. Explaining and understanding the framework ...... 18 3.3. Applying the framework to the cases ...... 19 3.3.1. Accra, Ghana ...... 20 3.3.2. Kigali, Rwanda ...... 20 4. Methodology ...... 21 4.1. Presentation and justification of data from documents and reports ...... 22 4.2. Presentation and justification of data from the interview ...... 24 4.3. Ethical considerations ...... 26 4.4. Connection to the analytical framework ...... 27 4.5. Limitations and delimitations ...... 28 5. Findings ...... 30 5.1. Urbanisation context ...... 30 5.2. Kigali, Rwanda: Urbanisation control, use of land, preserving the natural environment ... 32 5.2.1. Findings of documents and reports ...... 32 5.2.2. Findings of the interview ...... 35 5.3. Accra, Ghana: Informal urbanisation, actor capacity, uncontrolled land use, room for improvement ...... 36 6. Analysis ...... 38 6.1. Context and population allocation ...... 38
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6.2. Actors ...... 39 6.3. Capacities and outcomes ...... 40 6.4. Actions, motivations, and outcomes ...... 43 7. Conclusion ...... 45 References ...... 48 Interviews ...... 54 Appendices ...... 55 Appendix I. Consent form ...... 55 Appendix II. Interview questions ...... 56
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List of tables and figures
Figure 1. Analytical framework: Environmental stewardship, Fig. 2, p. 605 (Bennett, et al., 2018).
Table 1. Population allocation: Ghana-Accra, Rwanda-Kigali.
Table 2. Actor – research question relations: Urbanisation and land use actors in Ghana and Rwanda.
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List of abbreviations
AMA Accra Metropolitan Assembly
CATE-Ghana Changing Attitudes Towards the Environment Ghana
DESA Department of Economic and Social Affairs
EPA Ghana Environmental Protection Agency Ghana
GCGL Graphic Communications Group Limited
GYES Global Youth in Environmental Sustenance
MININFRA Rwanda Ministry of Infrastructure
MoE Rwanda Ministry of Environment
NDPC National Development Planning Commission
NGO Non-Governmental Organisation
NHMF National Housing and Mortgage Fund
NLUDMP National Land Use & Development Master Plan
RISD Rwanda Initiative for Sustainable Development
RLMUA Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority
RSSB Rwanda Social Security Board
UNDP United Nations Development Programme
UN Rwanda United Nations Rwanda
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List of appendices
Appendix I. Consent form
Appendix II. Interview questions
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1. Introduction
This qualitative research studies in what way urbanisation can be used for efficient use of land. The two sites studied are Greater Accra, Ghana, and Greater Kigali, Rwanda. By analysing existing data, documents, and reports published by Ghanaian and Rwandan administrations and governmental entities, along with statistics and an interview with as additions to the data collection, this research seeks to explain how the usage of land resources and space can be efficient and sustainable by way of urbanisation. This research is abductive and uses the ‘Environmental Stewardship’ analytical framework by Bennett, et al. (2018) to explain and understand the research problem and locate the most critical aspects of urbanisation and land use to subsequently gather significant information to find possible solutions to the research questions and problem.
Urbanisation is a world-wide phenomenon where the population in urban settlements increases because of people migrating to cities from rural areas. Urbanisation has been steadily on the rise during the 2000s and 2010s, and projections suggest it will continue to do so throughout the century (Birch & Wachter, 2011, pp. 3-6). Land use efficiency means maximising gains of the resource ‘land’, which in an urban context indicates providing living space and services for maximised, yet sensible, amount of people within a given unit of built-up land. The sustainability debate has to a high extent been shaped by concerns on efficiency, as efficient usage preserves unused assets by avoiding excessive depletion of limited resources. In this research, sustainability represents minimising the impact on the environment, and the use of land resources and space, to accommodate a given amount of people. Land is in this research material and space that land naturally offers and can be utilised for various benefits (Kahiluoto & Kaseva, 2016; Zhang, et al., 2018).
Urbanisation in developing countries often lacks regulations and proper administration, leading to a set of issues such as sprawl, spontaneous settlements, and lack of hygiene. Unregulated spatial growth often accompanies this. Unhealthy, urban development stages have been identified in Accra, Ghana, as uncontrolled land use of the central city which subsequently spreads outwards – a process which becomes alarmingly irreversible as resources deplete (McCormick, et al., 2013;
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Montgomery & Balk, 2011; Ashiagbor, et al., 2019). The urban population in Rwanda is relatively low but is quickly on the rise (Goodfellow, 2014). Tensions and uncertainty followed the 1994 genocide and conflict in Rwanda. With the help of external actors, the local Rwandan government committed to a thoroughly thought-through and considerate plan to build up capital Kigali. Focus was put on spatial concerns by developing formal administrations to govern land use and building permits. Safety and a proper infrastructure were also central features of the plan. Results have proved that Kigali is a safe and well-performing city, with authorities taking land usage into account, and the city’s population is on the rise (Goodfellow & Smith, 2013). The city centre, spontaneous settlements, the natural environment and vegetation, and agricultural land, are the four categories of Greater Kigali’s land and add up to 730 square kilometres and is controlled by ‘City of Kigali’. Kigali has experienced a continuous, increase in their population only recently, as Rwandans were seeking security in Kigali after the genocide in 1994 (Manirakiza, et al., 2019). Meanwhile, Accra can be perceived as much less of a success administration-wise and regarding the control of land use which have contributed to the unregulated growth of low-income slums and thereby deteriorating land (Akubia, et al., 2020).
1.1. Research problem, objective, and question
As explained in more detail below, research has been done on the increasingly urbanising environment in Accra, Ghana (Ayambire, et al., 2019; Moller-Jensen, et al., 2012; Akubia, et al., 2020). Numerous studies have been done on the emergence of informal urbanisation around Kigali, Rwanda, and Kigali’s well-designed spatial planning (Goodfellow & Smith, 2013; Mugiraneza, et al., 2019). Spatial planning of cities and land use has further been studied by Zhang, et al. (2018) and Xie, et al. (2020). However, no research has hitherto been done on how local actors, in this case influential networks / organisations / authorities, in Kigali, Rwanda, compared to Accra, Ghana, can utilise urbanisation for efficient and sustainable use of land and space. The objective of this research is to identify how urbanisation can be utilised for sustainable and efficient use of land. The main research question that arises from this is (1) ‘What can be done by local actors in Rwanda and Ghana for urbanisation to facilitate the efficiency and sustainability of land use?’. Other research questions include (2) ‘What makes urbanisation in Rwanda successful?’ and, (3) ‘What can be done in Accra to utilise urbanisation for efficient and sustainable use of land?’.
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1.2. Relevance
Globally, the proportion of people living in cities is constantly growing, which brings advantages such as businesses and jobs – as well as disadvantages which because of structural, administrational, and economic weaknesses are more notable in developing countries. Spatially, clear divisions of land devoted to urban and residential areas on one hand, and other purposes on the other hand, suggests that the utilisation of land would be more controlled and effective, especially in areas where land is scarce (McCormick, et al., 2013; Xie, et al., 2020). As has been the case in developed countries, the importance of spatial planning can be credited as a fundamental element in clearing urban areas from unwanted effects related to urbanisation such as lack of sanitation, and congestion. In other words, proper management, and especially organisation and planning, of major cities prevent potential negative consequences of these urban zones (McCormick, et al., 2013). It is tricky for planning agencies in developing countries to allocate people and land in cities while the number of people in cities increase in a rapid pace. Therefore, they are in urgent need of efforts and information on adequate planning of land and space in and around cities (Montgomery & Balk, 2011, pp. 89-90). Rwanda is going through a transition where an increasing proportion of Rwandans enter the service-sector job market, instead of relying on self-sustainable agriculture, partially as a consequence of diminishing land that is available and suitable for cultivation (Nilsson, 2018). Ghana is experiencing similar problems with land availability, especially around cities like Accra as they expand in size both spatially and population- wise which causes more demand for land and increasingly limited amount of it (Ayambire, et al., 2019). Accra and its surrounding spaces are a typical example of an area under intense pressure as the number of residents escalates and urban land is thus intruding farmland – calling for immediate solutions for spatial order and structure. Given the context of the two locations, both Rwanda and Ghana are smaller, African, developing countries, but are comparable as they are different in terms of urbanisation successes: Accra being somewhat unregulated and chaotic whilst Kigali is, in comparison, functional and successful. For this reason, the two cases are chosen for this study. Two developing countries on the same continent, and different regarding urbanisation successes and managing sizable urbanisation flows, are criteria for finding the two cases. The cases are reflected in the main research question as urbanisation is more successful in one case than the other and can
10 thus be compared and therethrough find solutions to the research question. Research questions 2 and 3, see section 1.1., present how the cases are compared (Akubia, et al., 2020; Manirakiza, et al., 2019).
1.3. Structure
This research will first present a review of the literature on urbanisation and land resource use efficiency in general and in developing countries and investigate what literature exists on these issues in respect to Greater Accra and Greater Kigali. Subsequently an analytical framework is described and applied to these two cases and is narrowed down to the components that are relevant for the cases. The Methodology chapter sets out which methods are chosen to find answers to the research question, and why. The Findings present the data that was collected, which is analysed and discussed in the following chapter on Analysis. Finally, the Conclusion discloses this study by briefly stating what has been found through this research.
2. Literature review
Developing countries are experiencing increasing urbanisation with such intensity that the governments and persons in charge for the major cities often do not have the capability to maintain adequate structures in terms of roads, service networks, and other physical qualities, that are proportionate to the population size. This usually results in congestion and low-quality public roads and buildings (Henderson, 2002). Road and building quality should improve together with the development and urbanisation trends of cities since more people bring more know-how and work force for such development. The more people living within a given unit of land the cheaper the creation of stable roads and buildings will be. In many cases, developing countries lack the financial means for such efforts, making it difficult for the local actors to undertake the challenge of improving urbanised land (Chamberlin, et al., 2014).
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The most prominent, and virtually inevitable, gains of urbanisation include the variety of work- and consumption options, and the concentration of services to a smaller geographical area, also in developing countries. The sustainability and efficiency of utilising the gains often relies on the condition that there is proper spatial and physical planning behind the structure of the city (Zhang, 2016). Reshaping and development in terms of structures of the authorities in developing countries may also accompany urbanisation (Glaeser & Steinberg, 2017).
Urbanisation in developing countries is often characterised by unrestrained influxes of people moving from rural areas into cities and cities’ outskirts whose size expands along with the population. This causes so-called spontaneous and informal urban areas and income inequality between the neighbourhoods whose dwellers have different pasts and are from different income groups in these areas. Accra, Ghana, is no exception on this point (Crentsil & Owusu, 2018). Economic growth in bigger cities has both attracted people and been boosted further because of the agglomeration of economic activities as well as labour abundance and productivity, but the excessive expansion of cities tends to destroy the natural environment and is thus spatially inappropriate (Oteng-Ababio, 2014; Crentsil & Owusu, 2018; Akubia, et al., 2020). Furthermore, governments in developing countries are prone to steering virtually all attention and development actions to one main city – or few bigger cities where most activity and consumption occurs, causing superfluous urbanisation to just a handful of enormous cities (Duranton, 2015).
Depending on the perspective from which urbanisation is viewed, the accumulation of people in cities can be regarded as negative, positive, or a trade-off. The developed countries generally have the means to enhance the quality of their cities’ physical structure. However, on account of poverty, uncertainty, and insufficient planning – cities in developing countries are often flawed as they are troubled by unsanitary environments without adequate order in respect to land use (McCormick, et al., 2013; Montgomery & Balk, 2011, p. 89). The Accra region is on a path to quickly become acutely overcrowded and short on available land as the urban area broadens, for which recommendations have been made for local planners to transform the current allocation of land resource use into one that emphasises the preservation of the natural environment that is otherwise destroyed by constructions. Akubia et al.’s (2020) study argues for ceasing urbanisation into Accra,
12 and reclaiming land whose environment has previously been natural, but does not offer a solution as to where the residential areas would rather be allocated if current urban land were to be reclaimed (Akubia, et al., 2020).
It has been found that the escalating extent to which cities grow spatially does not systematically lead to less resources used per given area of land. In fact, the intensifying demand for resources within the city impedes resource efficiency as the urban area grows beyond the point it would maintain environmental qualities and facilitate the per-person resource use – but instead damages the ecological potential of a vast area (Güneralp & Seto, 2012). The urban Accra region is considered to be growing at such a pace that over-growth of roads and buildings has destroyed and continues to destroy, the natural environment (Akubia, et al., 2020). The ability of urban land to sustain a given amount of people has been argued to be facilitated if environmentally friendly and sustainable advancements are implemented into the physical structure of the city (Zhang, et al., 2018), but does not offer answers as to how people on one hand and land on the other hand should ideally – in respect to resource use efficiency – be allocated in order to find balance in urban versus ecological land use. The positive influence cities contribute to the practice of sustainable resource use has been explained by the accumulation of an increasing amount of people bringing skills from a wide range of occupations and therethrough generating a greater assortment of know-how to enhance the quality of the city (Long, et al., 2017). Although this would indirectly promote environmental preservation (Long, et al., 2017), there is no clear understanding about how – i.e. in what ways – urbanisation can be utilised, particularly in underdeveloped countries, for the efficiency and sustainability of the usage of land resources and space.
Although Kigali, Rwanda, is a very well controlled and safe city, the region has seen urban increase at such a rate that the spatial proportion of poorer districts outside of the modern city of the urban area is surpassing that of the formal urban area. These circumstances jeopardise the sustainability of Kigali’s future despite the very recent emergence of Kigali and a carefully created city plan (Manirakiza, et al., 2019). Studies have been done on Rwanda’s problem of gradually diminishing space in general and limited land suitable for agricultural uses. A main reason for this is the increasing population within Rwanda that indeed is geographically a small country but is becoming
13 more and more compact with people (Imasiku & Ntagwirumugara, 2019). Parallels can be drawn between this case and the challenges with the land allocation of Accra; the need for preserving natural land resources is stressed (Akubia, et al., 2020), but assessments on how agricultural- ecological-urban divisions of land should be allocated in relation to the quantity of residents is not set out.
Urbanisation in Rwanda leads to the replacement of previously natural, ecologically rich land, to urban land, which causes a reduction in land resource supply (Mugiraneza, et al., 2019). Poverty and inequality are partially to blame as well, since the lower-income groups do not have financial means to live in the modern and higher quality residential settlements. As for governance, accountabilities and obligations for the management of the city’s land use are shared by several – possibly too many – organisations, which impedes structural and organised leadership (Manirakiza, et al., 2019). On the other hand, there is a trend among Rwandans to switch from working mostly independently within subsistence agriculture to higher-income and more stable occupations in other fields of work (Nilsson, 2018).
The urbanisation issue in Accra and other major cities in Ghana relates to emerging neighbourhoods on the outskirts that are in seriously poor conditions because of increasing – and unrestrained – migration into cities which generate spatial growth that exceeds levels the administration and local institutions have the capacity to manage. This growth affects land availability as land becomes more and more limited in an increasingly big area, leaving less room for ecological land and agricultural services (Doan & Oduro, 2011; Ayambire, et al., 2019). Much has been written about the land scarcities of Accra (Moller-Jensen, et al., 2012; Ashiagbor, et al., 2019; Akubia, et al., 2020). As Doan & Oduro (2011) also acknowledge, lack of proper land use management by the local administrations is a central contributing factor to the ongoing problem (Crentsil & Owusu, 2018). Ashiagbor, et al. (2019) illustrate three unhealthy, consecutive stages of development as the progression of cities like Accra that are becoming too big too quickly – namely the improper, unofficial and unrestrained usage of land of the city centre which spreads to the outer areas of the larger city which then becomes established in their respective districts and are thus becoming increasingly irreversible both in terms of possibilities of reclaiming resource-
14 valuable, natural environments, and official authority over the areas. Solutions have included for the official, local land resource organisations to gain authority and supervision over land use in greater Accra to tackle the problem (Ashiagbor, et al., 2019).
Literature expressing the urgent need for adequate land use authorities and order is presented above by demonstrating the spatial growth of unrestrained, urban areas in Accra (Doan & Oduro, 2011) etc., and the benefits of proper land planning of Kigali is described along with Kigali’s and Rwanda’s economic and spatial constraints affecting capabilities of practicing efficient land resource use in the Kigali region (Manirakiza, et al., 2019) etc. Essentially, there has been extensive research on the spatial growth of urban environments and implications for the natural environment (Güneralp & Seto, 2012), reclaiming natural environments and the urgency for obtaining control over the nature surrounding Ghana’s cities (Akubia, et al., 2020; Ayambire, et al., 2019) and ecological reserves in Rwanda (Imasiku & Ntagwirumugara, 2019), the degree to which land is able to sustain urbanised areas (Zhang, et al., 2018), and trends in Rwanda on neglecting subsistence agriculture for work within other sectors largely due to uncertainty and unavailability of land for agriculture (Nilsson, 2018). As mentioned above, land use administrations in developing countries often find it challenging to govern irregular and increasing urbanisation of their cities (Montgomery & Balk, 2011, pp. 89-90). Literature on how urbanisation can be utilised and guided by local actors, i.e. networks and authorities, in Kigali, Rwanda, compared to Accra, Ghana, to use land and space efficiently and sustainably, is missing, and is therefore the research problem that this research will address.
3. Analytical framework
Based on the literature review, one can confirm that management and administration is critical for sustainable urbanisation in respect to both functionality and legitimately enabling and exploiting opportunities for efficient resource use and land use. In the Accra region in Ghana, this issue is more profound than in the Kigali, Rwanda, region, yet Manirakiza, et al. (2019) set out Kigali’s organisational problems as well, such as ambiguities in the distribution of work and liabilities
15 between organisations (Manirakiza, et al., 2019; Ayambire, et al., 2019; Imasiku & Ntagwirumugara, 2019; Ashiagbor, et al., 2019). Therefore, the Environmental Stewardship Framework by Bennett, et al. (2018), is used as the analytical framework of this research since the authors describe the framework as a means to identify the most vital factors to shape efficient maintenance over the environment and the usage of its resources (Bennett, et al., 2018). The framework by Bennett, et al. (2018) has previously been applied to, for instance, a case on stewardship for environmental sustainability and its entailed joint efforts in South Africa (Cockburn, et al., 2019). Regarding urbanisation, Lopez (2020), Silva & Krasny (2016), and Fisher, et al. (2012) use the concepts of environmental stewardship that are included within the framework to define their constructs. Silva & Krasny (2016), for instance, apply environmental stewardship into the urban setting and assert that it primary involves groups of people i.e. networks of actors who ensure the preservation of spaces of natural environment within the city to improve the city’s environmental sustainability through securing ecosystems in these spaces within the city (Silva & Krasny, 2016). Bennett, et al.’s (2018) framework will be used as a tool to locate the relevant aspects for the data collection, i.e. which questions should be asked to find answers to the research question. The following sections of this chapter will define and explain the framework in more detail and apply it to the cases of Greater Kigali and Greater Accra.
3.1. Defining the framework
3.1.1. Overview
The Environmental Stewardship framework for analysis includes five different categories that have an impact on the process of achieving the central goals of appropriate stewardship. The authors set out a definition of environmental stewardship in relation to their identification of components of the framework and the analytical framework itself, namely actors that engage in an active process of maintaining the natural environment in order to improve particular features of – or reclaim zones of – the environment for physical or mental wellness of people, economic gains, or undertaking concerns for ecological degradation to ensure e.g. sufficient resource supply to be refined into food and usable material. Included in this process is the interconnectivity of several classifications, as mentioned above, which are further divided into smaller parts. Participants in these processes can contribute to and perform these operations on the group-level such as fair sharing of limited 16 environmental assets within an area, collaboratively between several organisations or persons on the wider spectrum, or individually by persons. The system of participants is directly affected by the context; like geological, financial or political constraints and/or allowances; along with to what extent the local circumstances allow for operations to be carried through, like possible conflict or instability in the area, power, and having the needed tools (Bennett, et al., 2018).
3.1.2. Components
To elaborate on the structure and complexity of the interrelated components in this framework, the following section will map them out. An illustration of the components of the framework can be found in Fig. 2, p. 605 (Bennett, et al., 2018) and is provided below in Figure 1.
Figure 1. Analytical framework: Environmental stewardship, Fig. 2, p. 605 (Bennett, et al., 2018).
The (1) Context forms and either allows for or retards the other components. Included in the context is political stability or instability; the local, economic situation; natural abundance of resource supply; composition of the local demography; cultural traditions affecting whether changes in
17 practices that directly affect the environment can occur. Fundamentally, the context determines the outlook of the following components. The (2) Actors that carry out the procedures for stewardship can be composed as a connected group between several organisations, persons, associations, or other, for collaborative work. Alternatively, collaborative work can be done within a certain location by a single community to e.g. share and manage limited resources within that area among the community members. Lastly, stewardship can be performed by individual persons by being aware of how one uses the environment in terms of types of resources and product consumed and/or produced, and the ecological impact of regular activities, etc. (Bennett, et al., 2018).
Based on the context, the actors possess characteristics which represent their respective motives and ability to act. Bennett, et al. (2018) present a set of (3) Motivations that involve e.g. feeling obliged to use resources sensibly to avoid possible depletion or consequences, or for getting something in return such as appreciation. The motives principally encourage change and responsible behaviour among people and shall thus be maximised to increase the awareness of resource use. As this element serves as encouragement; possible limits are represented by the (4) Capacity – i.e. the legal room, available equipment, economic resources for, and power of, actors. It simply determines whether intended practices and procedures of stewardship are possible under given conditions. The (5) Actions are the very practices carried out by actors and range from abstaining from environmentally destructive behaviour which can include minimising unnecessary emissions or use of limited resources, to the creation of freely growing natural environments within urban areas, and efforts to reclaim spaces of natural environments. These procedures are intended to accomplish specific (6) Outcomes which may be the wide-spread or individual improvement of health; cleanliness of the surroundings or air; and efficiency of resource use – which in turn improve all the other components (Bennett, et al., 2018).
3.2. Explaining and understanding the framework
The actions as explained by Bennett, et al. (2018) encompass human activity and its consequences on the environment, i.e. the awareness and efforts of living more sustainably. Included in this is the promotion of efficient use of land resources, as land is limited and has the potential of offering natural resources. Therefore, stewardship over land is especially important, and outcomes of efforts
18 point to bolstering both spatial and resource- qualities, as stewardship procedures and aims recognise efficiency and resource use prominently (Bennett, et al., 2018; Kahiluoto & Kaseva, 2016).
Further, Bennett, et al.’s (2018) analytical framework comprises a vast diversity of factors that branch into additional options and varieties of effective stewardship, which can contribute to the promotion of environmentally safe processes on a range of different locations in different contexts. As such, a given location may identify and adopt the procedures that suit their situation and ability best. For example, an area where cultural circumstances or minimal supply of natural resources reduce possibilities of e.g. discontinuing environmentally questionable agricultural processes or food consumption, local stakeholders have the option of developing other attributes, e.g. creating or conserving ecological land such as forests. This is significant particularly for this research, as stewardship development takes the direction of allocating land in greater urban areas to use land resources in balance with increasing urbanisation, and prospects of urbanisation to improve and promote efficient land usage within the local settings. Urban and environmental sustainability and efficiency closely links to the framework – especially the ecological outcomes – and is therefore applicable to this study (Bennett, et al., 2018).
Previous research using and applying Bennett et al.’s (2018) framework on land use and its stewardship in South Africa have identified issues with natural resources and local groups that cooperate to optimise the usage of resources in the local areas. Based on the framework the authors found relevant actors and their respective capacities to carry through practices of cooperation between other actors and interaction with the natural environment to optimise the usage of natural resources in South African environments (Cockburn, et al., 2019; Bennett, et al., 2018).
3.3. Applying the framework to the cases
This section provides an understanding of how the chosen framework fits into the two cases, since the components of the framework indicate which factors ought to be considered when gathering data for this study. This is particularly described in section 4.4.
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3.3.1. Accra, Ghana
Urban land in Accra is projected to grow quickly and enormously in size which depletes areas that are dedicated for agriculture and the natural environment. Because of this, one can draw the conclusion that stewardship over land is in the wider sense either ineffective or absent. The emergence and growth of spontaneous and uncontrolled urban communities within the region call for communal efforts for stewardship. As the informal, urban areas are connected to their own respective environment under different circumstances, each community should reflect upon their own needs in terms of using the environment, and ability to preserve ecological areas, use more sustainable methods, and which of these methods are within reach financially and socially. Given that environmental associations, agencies, and managerial bodies take the local conditions and needs into account, as explained under ‘Components’ above, such groups can intervene in vulnerable areas. Since urbanisation changes the use and allocation of land, stewardship becomes increasingly important in urban areas where land is under more stress compared to non-used land outside cities. Analysing the situation in Accra, it is clear that the institutional capacity in the area is lacking and/or insufficient. Objectives that are of greatest relevance are the gaining of control of migration flows of and into Accra for Accra’s surrounding land not to deplete further due to growing, spontaneous infrastructure. Land that provides water and arable space for agriculture outside the city ought to be preserved, which is maintained through the control of urbanisation. Essentially, the goal is to promote a denser city with spaces of natural environments within and outside the urban area so that benefits, i.e. jobs and higher income, which cities often provide, are enjoyed by the residents whilst the entire land area of Greater Accra is used efficiently and sustainably. This would be done either on an organisational level or community-level. In carrying through these goals, urbanisation is controlled and optimises the efficiency of land use (Akubia, et al., 2020; Bennett, et al., 2018).
3.3.2. Kigali, Rwanda
In the Kigali region in Rwanda the main concerns that require stewardship are the limited area of land that can be used whilst it still must provide for the increasing population. Moreover, nation- wide poverty is limiting the abilities of essentially all local stakeholders to act. Therefore, the 20 economic capacities of Rwanda are meagre, but given the well-organised urbanisation of Kigali by putting large efforts into the public services and quality of constructions in accordance with the Rwanda Government’s Master Plan after the 1994 genocide – the collaboration of conducting the Master Plan showed that organisational capacity is solid and motivations included making agriculture more productive on the larger scale and the improvement of individuals’ incomes. More Rwandans constantly move from self-sustenance agriculture to other occupations for economic reasons, moving food production to a more productive and marketized manufacturing. This shows that urbanisation can improve productivity and the economy if the urban area is well planned and managed (Manirakiza, et al., 2019; Imasiku & Ntagwirumugara, 2019; Bennett, et al., 2018; Goodfellow & Smith, 2013; Nilsson, 2018).
4. Methodology
This abductive desk-study uses mainly reports and documents by authorities and organisations in Rwanda and Ghana as sources for data collection, as well as publications by UN-entities, which is further elaborated in section 4.1. Newspaper articles, statistics, and one online interview are used as additions to the aforementioned sources. This chapter presents and justifies these methods, sources of documents, reports, statistics, and newspapers separate from the methods of the interview. Ethical considerations, limitations and delimitations of the chosen methods are also included in this chapter. The analytical framework by Bennett, et al. (2018) is used to locate the components that are involved in and contribute to the quality and presence of environmental stewardship that in this case is used to focus on land- and urban management. Upon locating the relevant components, this study examines what makes urbanisation in Rwanda successful and similarly which factors can be improved in Accra, Ghana, based on findings of the management of urbanisation and land use in both cases: Accra and Kigali. Connections between methods and the framework are discussed in section 4.4. Based on the data collected, contexts of urbanisation and land use of Accra and Kigali are explored which provide grounds for comparing the two cases, and therethrough identify how local actors in developing countries can utilise urbanisation for efficient and sustainable use of land. How the researcher came to the decision of choosing Kigali and Accra as cases is explained in section 1.2.
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4.1. Presentation and justification of data from documents and reports
The methodology of this research is analysing reports and documents by the Accra and Kigali governments and relevant agencies, as well as from external sources. Reports and other official documents on land use- objectives, initiatives, and current situations are relevant in consideration of when analysing strategies on land use and urban land control, these documents hold data on what needs to be done and what has been done to promote sustainable urbanisation and land usage efficiency. Because the documents analysed include data on the context, local goals, material and human assets, and stakeholders – based on these documents, conclusions can be drawn on what assets and what needs Accra land use and urbanisation agencies possess, and in what ways administrations such as the Rwandan authority for land use RLMUA and City of Kigali have conducted stewardship over land and urbanisation control, to identify what can be done by whom to utilise urbanisation. These documents provide data on actor responsibilities and liabilities, contexts of the two cities, plans, and goals, regarding management of the environment in the cities and are furthermore official and published by legitimate authorities. The documents are from organisational entities and the central authorities for each city and are the most influential and relevant managerial bodies in their respective areas, and are therefore likely to be the most valid and reliable sources published by local actors, which are the reasons why they are chosen. For Rwanda, documents are found on the official websites of City of Kigali (2020) and Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority (2020b). Documents that are analysed and relates to land use and urbanisation in Greater Kigali are the following: Report on the management of housing (Planet Consortium, 2012), the policies for urbanisation (Rwanda Ministry of Infrastructure, 2015), the future plan for use of land in Rwanda (Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority, 2020a), and the policies for land use in Rwanda (Rwanda Ministry of Environment, 2019). When looking into these documents, the attention is aimed at current strategies and results of previous strategies of urbanisation management, land allocation, and management of the environment in Greater Kigali. In this way, findings reveal which and how actions have made Kigali’s urbanisation successful. Documents from organisational entities (Accra Metropolitan Assembly, 2020; Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2020) relating to Greater Accra are the following: Policy, background, and plan for the resilience of the city which includes plans on infrastructure and urbanisation
22 management (Accra Metropolitan Assembly, 2019) and (Yecham Property Consult, 2020), report on the environment and stakeholders for its stewardship (Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2015), and environmental issues and plans to undertake challenges of urban growth (Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2017). The findings of these documents aim to reveal the environmental context and stakeholder capacity of Greater Accra to achieve the fundamental research objective of this study – i.e. how urbanisation can be utilised for efficient resource use of land.
Apart from documents by local and national authorities, data by the United Nations Rwanda (UN Rwanda) are used as it provides an overview of Rwanda from an external and non-partisan perspective. This is to further ensure neutrality, reliability, validity, and to obtain the viewpoint of an external actor that is the United Nations (United Nations Rwanda, 2017, p. 91; United Nations Rwanda, 2020). Local newspapers ‘The New Times Rwanda’ (The New Times Rwanda, 2020a) for Rwanda, and ‘Graphic Online’ (Graphic Communications Group Limited, 2020) for Ghana, are looked into to get an understanding of trends and the most recent events and occurrences nationally, and the perspective on relevant topics of the media. Relevant articles are found by simply entering ‘urbanisation’ into the search bar of each website and thereafter selecting the most recent and most relevant pieces of news. Bryman (2012, p. 115) mentions that newspapers are a useful way to get a hold of discourses of events and trends in the country, but that one should be aware of possibilities of inaccurate or questionable information that may occur in mass media. Therefore, the two newspapers are investigated only moderately and contribute to only a minor part of methods and findings. The two commercial newspapers Graphic Online and The New Times Rwanda both claim to be widely used across their respective countries (Afful & GCGL, 2020; New Times Rwanda, 2020b; Bryman, 2012, p. 115). Statistics derived from United Nations (UN) are furthermore investigated with the possibility in mind that data may be inaccurate or only relatively precisely estimated. To maximise the legitimacy, accuracy, and reliability of statistics, the United Nations Population Division (United Nations Population Division, 2020) is the main source of statistical data since it is a part of the UN as a general data source (United Nations, 2020). International involvement and funding of programmes in the two countries have been found from the website of UN-Habitat (UN-Habitat, 2020).
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4.2. Presentation and justification of data from the interview
Purposive sampling is the search for samples, in this case interviewees, based on the relevance between potential interviewees and the research topic and questions. Interview candidates ought to hold information on the questions, in order for the researcher to find the data from the interview relevant and useful for this research (Bryman, 2012, p. 418). Bennett, et al. (2018) set out three categories of actors, out of which networks of persons i.e., organisations, authorities, and assemblies relevant to the local or national environment, space and land use, and urbanisation, are looked for since they are likely to have access to or knowledge on their particular field that matches the topics of this research, in their particular location. Separate individual actors (Bennett, et al., 2018) according to criterium point 1 stated below have also been searched for. To create a variety in interview candidates, the invited candidates are chosen based upon the following characteristics:
1. person working actively with land use, the environment, urbanisation, in Kigali or Accra
2. person belonging to or connected to an Accra-based or Kigali-based actor network with at least some degree of capacity
3. person belonging to or connected to a network that actively works in Rwanda or Ghana with either:
a. the natural environment
b. land use
c. urbanisation
d. physical infrastructure
e. upgrading / prevention of informal urban settlements
f. urban sustainability and planning
g. environmental sustainability
One semi-structured, digital interview held on Zoom is used as a means of collecting data. Bryman (2012, p. 212) mentions that semi-structured interviews include a preparation of mostly open-ended
24 questions by the interviewer, and the answers by the interviewee may inspire follow-up questions by the interviewer which were not initially included in the list of questions. This method thus enables elaborate and free answers by the interviewee which essentially is necessary to explain phenomena or how something happens – which applies to the research question that can be found in section 1.1. (Bryman, 2012, p. 212). The interview represents Kigali / Rwanda, which is helpful in respect to the research question since this location has been regarded as a model for successful urbanisation by e.g., Goodfellow (2014) and Goodfellow & Smith (2013). Interview requests were sent out to approximately eleven e-mail addresses out of which the majority did not reach back at all, some declined after a few days, some declined after several weeks. Reminder e-mails were sent out a few days after the initial e-mail was sent, and some candidates were called instead. Neither facilitated the recruiting process. One person approved the request, however several weeks after the request was sent out. Due to the low response rate and time limit to finish this research, conducting more than one interview was impossible within the given time frame despite efforts to recruit more interviewees. Therefore, the data collected from the interview conducted, is used to add to and validate findings of documents and reports. Limitations and delimitations associated with this are explained in section 4.5.
The conducted interview certainly adds validity to the findings, as the interviewee was able to provide informative responses relevant for this research. The interview was conducted on 21 December 2020 on Zoom. The interviewee, henceforth referred to as Interviewee 1, wishes not to have their name mentioned, but allows their occupation and whom they work for to be mentioned. Interviewee 1 is an architect and urban planner and works for the City of Kigali. The data collected from the interview confirms, supports, and adds to certain elements found in the data from reports and documents.
Several of the main documents used for data collection in this research are found on the website of City of Kigali, the main authority of the city and Master Plan (City of Kigali, 2020). Therefore, an actor with additional information about and knowledge on the issues in these documents presented in section 5.2.1. is the most relevant for this research and research question.
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4.3. Ethical considerations
Due to the use of an interview as a means of collecting data, ethical issues are considered. Bryman (2012, pp. 135-136) describes four fields of ethical considerations in social research, including issues on deception, informed consent, privacy, and harm. Essentially, both parties – the interviewer that is the researcher, and the interviewee – are made aware of the aforementioned fields of ethical considerations in social research, in the shape of a consent form. This consent form is signed by both parties prior to the interview. It is comprised of eight points of ethical considerations to which both parties consent to by signing the form before the interview. It is stated that both parties are made aware of that interview outcomes are only used for the purpose of data collection for this research; no non-essential personal data is collected; interview is voluntary and; confidentiality of both parties; data use policies; no coercion by any party; right to refuse to participate in the interview; right to remain anonymous; the interview will be recorded; right to refuse to respond; right to leave the interview at any point; right to withdraw answers (Bryman, 2012, pp. 135-136). The full version of the consent form can be found in Appendix I. The consent form signed by the interviewer is sent to the interviewee who, by singing it, consents to the points of ethical considerations as clearly stated in the consent form. To ensure the right of interviewees to remain anonymous, the interviewee is explicitly asked by the interviewer whether the interviewee wants their a) name, b) occupation/function, and c) entity that they work for, to be mentioned in this research. The researcher includes name and/or occupation and/or whom they work for only if the interviewee consents to this. The interviewee was contacted prior to the interview about a request to participate in an interview for this particular research. The request was accepted by the interviewee and an authority. The reliability of the methods and research is strengthened by recording the interview so that the researcher can replay the interview, which according to Bryman (2012, p. 219), is important to avoid misjudging any information the interviewee states. The main interview questions were sent to the interviewee, Interviewee 1, to inspect prior to the interview, which according to Bryman (2012, p. 218) is important in order for the interviewee to prepare and have a vision of what is going to be asked during the interview. These interview questions can be found in Appendix II. General social research interview
26 guidelines set forth by Bryman (2012, pp. 217-220) are adhered to, and the recording of the interview is sent to the Interviewee 1.
4.4. Connection to the analytical framework
As explained in section 3.3.1. the main areas of interest in respect to urbanisation in Accra is the organisational- community- and institutional capacity which could be improved, which is mentioned by Akubia, et al. (2020), and restore and prevent deteriorating land, and potential for creating a more sustainable urban environment as objectives. How this can be done through urbanisation is the central line of interest of the data collection, and the land planning actions of Kigali actors is going to guide through how urbanisation can be conducted in a developing country as it has been considered a great land allocation success by e.g., Goodfellow & Smith (2013) and Goodfellow (2014).
Relevant data to be looked for have been identified by examining Bennett, et al.’s (2018) analytical framework which is explained above in chapter 3., and by looking into the urbanisation dynamics versus land use in the cases in articles such as (Akubia, et al., 2020) and (Ashiagbor, et al., 2019) for Accra, and, (Manirakiza, et al., 2019) and (Goodfellow & Smith, 2013) for Kigali. Bennett, et al.’s (2018) framework is here narrowed down to only the relevant elements used which have been identified on the basis of the literature that is examined on the two cases, and the search for data will thus focus on these elements and not every sub-component of the framework. The presentation and justification of choosing these elements are set forth above, i.e. organisational capacities, natural land restoration and improvement objectives, communal, group- or organisational actors, and location of plausible actions. As the problems of urbanisation in Accra and successes of urbanisation in Kigali are identified in previous sections of this research – and in relation to the analytical framework in sections 3.3.1. and 3.3.2. – Bennett, et al.’s (2018) framework is applied to both cases, and the case of Kigali’s urbanisation is used as a way of identifying opportunities urbanisation provides for land use efficiency through urbanisation for Accra. Obtaining data from documents are based on what needs to be done, what can be done, what has been done, by whom and how it can be done, in Accra / Kigali to utilise urbanisation for efficient land use.
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In sum, the methods of this research are the investigation of documents, reports, and publications by local authorities and assemblies as the central sources; publication by UN in Rwanda; statistics, reports and evaluations on the two sites by the UN; and two local newspapers. Chosen components of Bennett, et al.’s (2018) framework which are relevant for this particular research are applied to the findings in order to identify the opportunities of utilising urbanisation. Indirectly, Kigali, Rwanda, is used as a case of successful urbanisation – a model for community- and authority stakeholders for land use and urbanisation in Accra.
4.5. Limitations and delimitations
Ashiagbor, et al. (2019) mention that the land and urbanisation managerial entities in Accra are diffuse and, in a sense, ineffective and unorganised in their work, which could be a challenge regarding the collection of data from documents as they may because of this be ambiguous or inadequate. Similar confusion of duties and liabilities between agencies in Kigali is mentioned by Manirakiza, et al. (2019), and may therefore represent a similar limitation. The researcher delimits this by approaching each document with certain standards – i.e. assessing how reliable and legitimate the document seems. The document is dismissed by the researcher if the reliability and validity seem to be lacking. Characteristics that are looked for and sought after in these documents, and moreover included to some extent in all documents used, are:
1. published by a governmental authority
2. accessed on an official website of an official authority, organisation, ministry or assembly
3. generally trusted sources are included in the document
4. published relatively recently, i.e. data is as up to date as possible
Limitations may also involve the unavailability of certain information in these documents. Since this research studies two different locations, there may be differences in availability of equivalent information about a given issue. Although it has a slight effect on the quantity of data, it does not
28 decrease the quality of the data or findings significantly. Furthermore, the ability to make comparisons between an individual aspect between the two sites is not of significant importance for this research. Yet the researcher considers that the data that is needed to conduct this research is sufficiently available in the documents and reports used. Not all documents found on the government web page of Kigali (City of Kigali, 2020) are available in English, which due to the language barrier limits the amount of data that the researcher can analyse. On the other hand, the most important documents relevant for this research are available in English and are presented in section 4.1. These documents aside, the reliability of newspapers examined, and statistical data is questionable, is further explained above in section 4.1. These statistical data limitations are delimited by approaching these sources and data accordingly – i.e. to not regard them as exact facts, but rather as an indication of and contribution to the statistic as a whole.
As for the interview, there may be language barriers preventing either party from fully expressing themselves. This may also contribute to misunderstandings or misinterpretations which in turn affect the data extracted from the interview. The interviewer may misinterpret the answer and the interviewee may misinterpret the question. The fact that only one interview is used affects the validity and reliability of the findings since there is no other interviewee to confirm this data which therethrough impedes generalisation. The reliability of data per se of this particular interview is not affected by this, but rather the entirety of ‘findings of interviews’. This is delimited by using the interview as an addition and confirmation of data from reports and documents, not as the central source of findings. Therefore, the ‘findings of documents and reports’ represent the substantial and central bulk of findings.
Furthermore, a delimitation of this study is not to evaluate the overall, environmental impact of efficient land use and urbanisation on other natural resources, as this study only focuses on the resource of land. For the same reason, impacts on social, economic, or other aspects are not focused on in detail either.
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5. Findings
5.1. Urbanisation context
According to the UN Population Division, approximately 18 percent of Rwandans lived in urban areas in 2018, but the urbanisation is expected to increase during the coming decades. Compared to Ghana, where approximately 56 percent of Ghanaians lived in urban areas in 2018 and is also predicted to continue to grow, the differences are apparent. In Ghana, the urban percentage is moreover above the Africa average, whilst Rwanda is below the Africa urban average percentage. Accra’s population amounted to 2,439,000, and Kigali 1,058,000, the same year (UN Population Division, DESA, UN, 2018a; UN Population Division, DESA, UN, 2018b). In 2019, Rwanda’s total population was approximately 12 million (UN Population Division, DESA, UN, 2019b), and Ghana’s approximately 29 million (UN Population Division, DESA, UN, 2019a). One shall consider the possibilities of inaccuracies of these statistical estimates.
The total population, Kigali’s and Accra’s populations respectively, and the percentage of the respective total population living in urban areas, provide data that can be calculated into what percentage of the urban population of each country live in Kigali / Accra, and what percentage of the total population of each country live in Kigali / Accra. This indicates whether the urban and total population is concentrated to Kigali / Accra, or if it is distributed across other cities. The formulas used to calculate results can be found directly above Table 1. that displays the results of calculations. Results are rounded off by 2 decimals. Findings reveal the total populations of the two countries (UN Population Division, DESA, UN, 2019a; UN Population Division, DESA, UN, 2019b), urban populations and national urban proportion in percent (UN Population Division, DESA, UN, 2018a). Again, it is emphasised that the data – and therefore also results of calculations – are inexact and provide estimations.
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퐶푖푡푦 푝표푝푢푙푎푡푖표푛 푃푒푟푐푎푛푡푎푔푒 표푓 푐표푢푛푡푟푦 푟푒푠푖푑푒푛푡푠 푙푖푣푖푛푔 푖푛 푐푖푡푦 = 푇표푡푎푙 푐표푢푛푡푟푦 푟푒푠푖푑푒푛푡 푝표푝푢푙푎푡푖표푛
푃푒푟푐푎푛푡푎푔푒 표푓 푢푟푏푎푛 푝표푝푢푙푎푡푖표푛 푙푖푣푖푛푔 푖푛 푐푖푡푦 퐶푖푡푦 푝표푝푢푙푎푡푖표푛 = (퐶표푢푛푡푟푦 푢푟푏푎푛 푝표푝푢푙푎푡푖표푛 푝푒푟푐푒푛푡푎푔푒 × 푇표푡푎푙 푐표푢푛푡푟푦 푟푒푠푖푑푒푛푡 푝표푝푢푙푎푡푖표푛)
Country Ghana Rwanda City Accra Kigali % of country residents living in city 8.41% 8.82% % of urban population of country living in city 15.02% 48.98% Table 1. Population allocation: Ghana-Accra, Rwanda-Kigali.
Results derived from Table 1 indicate that roughly the same proportion of Ghanaians live in Accra as Rwandans live in Kigali. Almost half of the urban dwellers in Rwanda live in Kigali whilst only 15.02 percent of urban dwellers in Ghana live in Accra. This implies that there are proportionately more Ghanaians residing in other cities than Accra than there are Rwandans residing in other cities than Kigali.
In 1975, approximately 30 percent of Ghanaians lived in urban areas, 40 percent by 1995, and 50 percent just before 2010. In Rwanda, the urban population was low, remaining under 10 percent, and rather stagnant until 1995 when it rose to 10 percent, and to 15 percent in 2000 (UN Population Division, DESA, UN, 2018a). The total population of Rwanda was just below 5 million in 1975, and approximately 8 million by 2000 (UN Population Division, DESA, UN, 2019b). The total population of Ghana was approximately 10 million in 1975, and 19 million in 2000 (UN Population Division, DESA, UN, 2019a).
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5.2. Kigali, Rwanda: Urbanisation control, use of land, preserving the natural environment
5.2.1. Findings of documents and reports
UN Rwanda confirms that the migration patterns specifically to cities can be administered and land use plans can be outlined, largely because of the control and administration of land which have been improved by the obtainment of records of land uses nationally. Programmes on building sustainable physical buildings, streets, and other structures, have been and are being successfully executed (United Nations Rwanda, 2017, p. 9). UN-Habitat Rwanda has been extensively involved in the process to rebuild accommodations and land use systems, and the advancement of urban foundations, since the national conflict 1994 and the immigration of Rwandans returning to the country after having fled. An increasing amount of people were thus settling in a country that had been torn down by the genocide. Preservation of the natural environment and creation of resilient urban environments – and importantly also the establishment of Rwandan institutions to maintain control of these environments – were prioritised. The fact that UN-Habitat has partaken in and financed this has created a useful foundation for local stakeholders in Rwanda to maintain the administrative assets. In some cases, ONE-UN Fund and UNDP have contributed to the funding of operations (Francioni, 2015, pp. 6-18).
The housing situation and priorities in Kigali that 50+ percent of housing that is planned on being constructed will, above all, focus on the affordability of these dwellings in order to avoid problems of uncontrolled and growth of informal urban areas that in turn are planned on being renovated into or replaced by accommodation that is equipped with more modern and sustainable utilities and structures. Moreover, rural-urban migrants are being incentivised and steered to other cities in Rwanda than Kigali to maintain an adequate size of Kigali and avoid possible consequences of overpopulation and uncontrolled construction. In terms of building new, appropriate, and realistic accommodation in Kigali, the density of residences is encouraged, and the importance of considering financial capacities and cultural factors is emphasised. If construction of new accommodation establishments proceeds in accordance with these guidelines, the spatial area of construction will remain within the land availability limits and is thus sustainable (Planet
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Consortium, 2012). The tasks of execution, operation, and enforcement of urbanisation plans shall be carried out by governmental ministries whose functions correspond to their given tasks. These actors are Ministries of -Urbanisation, -Lands, - Local Government, -Economy, and -Sports & Culture (Rwanda Ministry of Infrastructure, 2015, p. 44).
Rwanda Ministry of Infrastructure (MININFRA) (2015) states that priorities of urbanisation in Rwanda are to densify the population into cities and villages of different sizes. Land resource use is optimised through this densification as it leaves space for ecological and agricultural land that is the non-built-up land. Agriculture is marketized and optimised as farmers enter the formal market, and advanced institutional capacity is maintained by way of locally-accustomed, professional, and educated authorities that are able to make use of obtainable data and existing information and digital technology to evaluate and ensure urban quality and sustainability. The infrastructure quantity needed to accommodate a given amount of people is moreover optimised as cities are denser, and is therefore also less costly and occupies less land area (Rwanda Ministry of Infrastructure, 2015, pp. 17, 19-20, 25-28).
Urbanisation in Rwanda is associated with increased consumption activity and more opportunities for employment and thus increased productivity and higher incomes (Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority, 2020a, pp. 10-11). A dense urbanisation of Kigali is encouraged, together with urbanisation of three additional urban cities “satellite cities” that show prospects of contributing significantly to economic growth, located slightly outside Kigali, to avoid overpopulation of Kigali. The economic and employment activities of three cities are dominated by a respective sector – one as a junction for the coordination of goods; one for industries; and one for agriculture. This plan implies planned urbanisation on the condition that the population is more concentrated so that the urban area of the city stay within the optimal spatial limits. The trend of rural-urban migration to Kigali indirectly facilitates the control of these movement and settlement patterns of people – urbanisation – since the other cities in Rwanda are much less popular. RLMUA asserts that Kigali is profoundly superior in population increase compared to the other cities, including target populations. Furthermore, by approximately 2050 the goal of maintaining Kigali as the biggest and central city, plus the three satellite cities and smaller but denser towns; has resulted in gathering
33 economic growth mainly into the concentrated, urban areas that is Kigali and the three additional cities, agricultural marketisation and productivity increases as small-scale cultivators are encouraged to move into denser dwellings. People are as a result accumulated into several locations – neither scattered across the country nor concentrated into one location. The plan also leaves room for ecological land, and land is therefore used most efficiently. The “satellite cities” as mentioned above are prioritised for urbanisation as Kigali’s peripheral, spontaneous, and lower-quality dwellings are expanding beyond sustainable and controllable limits. The population limit of Greater Kigali is 3,800,000. According to the Ministry of Environment (MoE) (2019, pp. 18-19), the Master Plan 2020 (NLUDMP) is the foremost and dominant set of rules and regulations on land use in Rwanda and Kigali, followed by two subsequent subdivisions that assess how appropriate the purpose of the outcome is, and construction processes, of the planning of land (Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority, 2020a, pp. ix-x, 29-34; Rwanda Ministry of Environment, 2019, pp. 18-19, 35). The implementation of land use plans will be funded by tax revenue derived from land ownership and activities – paid to the government that is – and external donors (Rwanda Ministry of Environment, 2019, p. 35).
By law, changes to land cover and use shall be done with consideration to the national regulations of land planning. Agriculture, a substantial proportion of the Rwandan total land, national economy, and employment, has since 2004 become more controlled, large-scale rather than small- scale, and efficient due to land- regulation, laws, and policies. To facilitate this further, establishing smaller centres of villages enhances productivity in agriculture additionally, as human capital for managing agriculture in each village is thus optimised and carried out collectively. The Ministry promotes urbanisation as it is beneficial for the labour market and higher incomes, along with the agglomeration of dwellings and people which allow for control by the government of the natural environment that is left uninhabited. Rwanda is striving for 30 percent of national land to be kept as untouched forest whilst partaking in the Bonn Challenge to carry out 2,000,000 ha of reforestation nationally (Rwanda Ministry of Environment, 2019, pp. 1-3, 6-7).
Kigali-based civil society entity Rwanda Initiative for Sustainable Development (RISD) carries out local operations and programmes to advance the quality of urban land and its residents (RISD,
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2016). In a The New Times Rwanda news article published on 11 December 2020 it is claimed that RISD has contacted the Kigali main authority for RISD to administer actions under a programme to enable locals to transform two slum areas into more robust, resilient and higher-quality houses, whilst the people whose houses the project is aimed at, may stay in their location as a solution to the infrastructure and affordability issue in Rwanda (Ntirenganya, 11 December 2020). Further news on projects to construct inexpensive accommodation alternatives in Greater Kigali was published in an article on 25 November 2020 in which it appears that such programmes will be negotiated between construction planners and national welfare bureau RSSB. This would also be to combat the challenges of uncontrollable sprawl in informal urban areas (Mwai, 25 November 2020). As it seems, the informal urbanisation challenge is currently being undertaken in Kigali (Mwai, 25 November 2020; Ntirenganya, 11 December 2020). As mentioned in section 4.1.1., limitations to the reliability of news shall be kept in mind.
5.2.2. Findings of the interview
This section presents the data from the interview with Interviewee 1. Interviewee 1 who is an architect and urban planner for the City of Kigali, was able to provide expertise on the urbanisation and land use management in Rwanda and Kigali and was able to answer all seven principal questions that can be found in Appendix II. Interviewee 1 emphasises that the urbanisation success of Rwanda largely owes to adequate, national leadership, and adequate policies, which allows for appropriate urban planning. Urban and land policies maintain that the construction of new buildings and infrastructure shall primarily be built on existing urban land rather than occupying, i.e. urbanising, untouched land. The City of Kigali maintains policies on densification of dwellings to administer and spare land as much as possible. As for the upgrading of slums and informal settlements, the informal urban areas are upgraded according to the guidelines of the Master Plan 2020 that ought to be complied with in all land use development projects – into more dense and higher quality dwellings so that residents may stay in their location. Most dwellings in Greater Kigali are detached houses, which are transformed into apartment buildings to densify dwellings, i.e. vertical development. As such, urban areas of Kigali remain dense and contain reduced informal settlements. Development of new urban areas, and urban upgrading, must follow the density rule and requirements according to the Master Plan, to manage the stressors of local land scarcity along
35 with urbanisation. Moreover, all wetlands in Kigali are protected, meaning that the authorities prohibit demolishing any construction in these wetlands, to preserve the forest and natural environment in these areas. Residents of steep slopes are moved to social housing, to prevent urban sprawl and protect the environment of these hills. To avoid overpopulation and overexpansion of Kigali – universities, government institution headquarters, and markets depending on the natural resource supply in the respective area, are established in satellite cities and secondary cities around Kigali, which creates employment and incentives for people to move there instead of into Kigali. In this way, migrants into Kigali are not refused, but rather steered by pull-factors into other cities, which enables urbanisation without urban sprawl or overpopulation. As cities grow, agricultural productivity in the countryside increases as demand increases.
5.3. Accra, Ghana: Informal urbanisation, actor capacity, uncontrolled land use, room for improvement
Accra’s main problem regarding urbanisation and land use is the lack of control of migration to the city which causes the construction of unplanned dwellings on an increasingly large area on the peripheries of the city, occupying unsustainably large areas of progressively deteriorating land. Accra Mayor Hon. Mohammed Adjei Sowah demonstrates a plan that involves construction permit discounts on the condition that the construction has the lowest possible destructive impact upon the environment. He also stresses the need to increase the residence density of Accra. A significant role in the process of reaching objectives is improved administration and control of actions (Yecham Property Consult, 2020, pp. 14, 16). Further on the encouragement of building more environmentally friendly and sustainable residences, UN-Habitat has listed five actors that fund such housing programmes, for example the ‘Green Loans Programme’ from which local construction units lend money needed for sustainable and robust resources and supplies needed for the construction of residences. In terms of improving infrastructure in general in Accra, financial means are often lacking. NGOs may partially stand for funding for such programmes and investments, but the government of Rwanda is responsible for the most part of the funding (Bokpin, et al., 2020, pp. xxiv-xxv, 28-29).
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Accra Metropolitan Assembly (AMA) sets forth in the 2019 report on Accra city planning three pillars that represent dimensions of the city that needs to be improved through actions that would facilitate the sustainability, quality, and control of a given function or aspect of Accra (Accra Metropolitan Assembly, 2019, p. 5). The second pillar is aimed at responsibilities of the use of resources – one of AMA’s obligations. AMA is currently relatively distant from the local communities and residents which leads to the deficiency or absence of both knowledge on community-local contexts as well as cooperation and communication with people and communities in Accra. Obtainment of knowledge on the context and necessary actions for e.g. infrastructure or environmental concerns of local communities, and action planning based on this knowledge, is a central demand AMA needs to undertake to increase their ability to execute effective actions. Concern nr. 18 included in the second pillar addresses the insufficiency of education among inspectors who are responsible for assessing constructions and urban settlements in Accra which leads to unsustainable and poorly functioning infrastructure, which in turn adds to the problem of growing informal, urban areas. As a solution, AMA Dept. of Physical Planning, and AMA Works Dept. are responsible for setting up proper education that includes detailed teaching on land, land resources, and land suitability for construction, for the construction professionals. Therethrough, resource use of land is more regulated, sustainable, and robust (Accra Metropolitan Assembly, 2019, pp. 69-73, 90). As for the capacity insufficiencies of AMA, concern nr 15 addresses this by working on-location with individual communities to assess conditions and needs in separate locations within urban Accra. This would be performed by AMA workers and an implementation responsibility of two AMA Departments that manage affairs of communities and HR (Accra Metropolitan Assembly, 2019, p. 82).
The Environmental Protection Agency Ghana (EPA) claims to work with several NGOs, e.g. GYES and CATE-Ghana, to advocate for the public the need to conserve the natural environment country-wide. EPA’s tasks include the assessment of land use and regulations, and the advocacy of environmental sustainability. EPA does not, however, have the power or ability to execute operations in practice (Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2015, pp. 1-2, 29).
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EPA together with several other assemblies, for example NDPC, contribute to collecting information on the land use and environmental conditions in Ghana. Their work on collecting this information, however, is insufficient. Inaccessibility, or simply the absence, of data on land- quality, suitability, and use, country-wide, is a substantial constraint for land use administrators to carry through operations to restore deteriorated land and to evaluate land use versus land purposes. This data concerns mostly the level of deterioration of a given land unit, and base on that subsequent plans to act on threats. As not much is known about land quality for land use, there is not much land use planners can plan or do to control and manage land. If land is deteriorating due to e.g. pollution or stress induced by humans, oblivious to authorities, land may be lost and the deterioration may be irreversible which increases land scarcity further (Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2017, pp. 139, 149). In a news article published on Graphic Online 21 October 2020 the authors describe that there are seemingly projects by the Fund NHMF to lower mortgages and thus lowering costs of accommodation that there is a shortage of in Ghana (Glover & Ocloo, 21 October 2020).
6. Analysis
6.1. Context and population allocation
This chapter on analysis applies Bennett, et al.’s (2018) framework to findings. It is apparent that the rapidity of urbanisation is more significant in Accra than Kigali (UN Population Division, DESA, UN, 2018a). By maintaining land registers, continue the work by e.g. RISD to improve informal settlement areas, and maintaining a relatively dense city population – a larger proportion of urban settlements that in Accra are intruding upon natural environments because of the urban areas’ large size, can be controlled more easily. The Ministry of Environment’s “villagization” of smaller-scale cultivators into marketized agriculture would thus encompass the non-urban population. Outcomes of such a population allocation are hence boosting the capacity of authority stakeholders to plan land use and use urbanisation to the advantage of the management of land resource uses. Urbanisation in Rwanda can be classified as planned into other cities than just the main city, Kigali, to utilise urbanisation for efficient land use and avoiding significant stressors such as sprawl and slum expansion, instead of merely blocking migrants from entering the city
38 without further action (Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority, 2020a, pp. 29-34; Ntirenganya, 11 December 2020; Yecham Property Consult, 2020, pp. 14-16; Rwanda Ministry of Environment, 2019, p. 35). Since plans and decision-making on urban planning and land use planning cannot be carried through without adequate data and information as bases for the decisions – e.g. the quality state or suitability of land for agriculture – data availability is crucial. Rwanda and Kigali authorities provide substantial supplies of land- and demographic data, such as (Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority, 2020a), whilst similar data is meagre for Ghana. Provision of data through evaluation and measurements are thus necessary for Accra and Ghana to improve the management and planning of settlements, movements of people, and land (Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2017, pp. 139, 149; Bennett, et al., 2018).
6.2. Actors
This section explores the actor constellation and differences between Rwanda actors and Ghana actors through a table, separately from the other components to locate the central stakeholders which are hereafter analysed in more detail in section 6.3. Categories have been identified according to the analytical framework by Bennett, et al. (2018). Based upon the data found in section 5, i.e. data from the following sources: (Accra Metropolitan Assembly, 2019; Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2015; Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2017; Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority, 2020a; Planet Consortium, 2012; Rwanda Ministry of Environment, 2019; UN-Habitat, 2020; Rwanda Ministry of Infrastructure, 2015; City of Kigali, 2020; Yecham Property Consult, 2020; United Nations Rwanda, 2017; Francioni, 2015; Bokpin, et al., 2020), and Interviewee 1, the researcher identifies information which is shown in Table 2 whose purpose is to obtain an overview of the abundance of actors and how closely each actor relates to the research question. The Rwanda actors are more abundant and encompassing in terms of their responsibilities, and all-in-all provide more, and more easily accessible, data and publications than the Ghana actors.
The research question is ‘How can urbanisation facilitate the efficiency and sustainability of land use?’.
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Table 2. Actor – research question relations: Urbanisation and land use actors in Ghana and Rwanda.
6.3. Capacities and outcomes
Findings as a whole – the central documents being by Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority (2020) and Accra Metropolitan Assembly (2019) – suggest that differences in capacity are an utterly important contributor of the efficiency of stewardship and management of land use and urbanisation. The capacities of actors in the two locations are therefore more emphasised than the other components. The component of context is explored above in section 6.1. (Bennett, et al., 2018).
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Bennett, et al. (2018) mention in their analytical framework on Environmental Stewardship that the capacity of actors is influenced by several factors. The outcome of the management of land use and urbanisation which in this case is a healthy urban environment as explained in section 3.3., is largely affected by the quality of capacities of organisational and authority actors since these actors essentially have the far-reaching power and access to carry through broad operations on the management and evaluation of land, compared to that of single persons or communities. Looking over the achievements, actions, and structures of the local land use authorities that include mainly AMA (Accra Metropolitan Assembly, 2019), RLMUA (Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority, 2020a), and the Rwanda Ministry of Environment (Rwanda Ministry of Environment, 2019), in Rwanda and Ghana respectively, one can pin-point several differences in the institutional assets – i.e. power and efficiency of these organisation which enable actions to be executed – which in turn contribute to capacities and therefore also outcomes since the quality of the former influences the latter (Bennett, et al., 2018).
Findings revealed that AMA have been having and are having problems with the obtainment of data in respect to land use, land quality, and suitability for purposes, e.g. construction and cultivation. This data has simply been meagrely available and therefore meagrely usable for AMA and the AMA Dept. of Physical Planning to use for plans and decisions on land use. For example, land that is deteriorating in e.g. natural riches and value goes unnoticed by authorities and that unit of land may thus be lost. The absence or insufficiency of authority workers on a particular location, along with data unavailability, impedes the resources and knowledge base decision-makers need to decide on what actions ought to be taken to e.g. reclaim deteriorating natural land or whether a land unit is suitable for agriculture. The weaknesses in institutional assets are also reflected in the expansion of informal urbanisation in Accra in the sense that the construction professionals responsible for evaluating the quality and sustainability of dwellings, are relatively uneducated and do therefore not have the full ability to fulfil their job, leaving dwellings with inadequate inspection of the urban dwellings which therethrough carries the risk of unsustainable construction of the urban area and thus unsustainable and inefficient use of built-up land, and the contribution to otherwise avoidable land deterioration. If ambitions by AMA to work on these issues are done according to plan in the 2019 Report by AMA, land use could be much more well managed, and urban areas would be controlled and thus used in the most sustainable way – enhancing capacities 41 of authorities to utilise urbanisation for more efficient land use rather than letting urbanisation impede it (Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2017, pp. 39, 49; Accra Metropolitan Assembly, 2019, pp. 69-73, 82, 90).
In Rwanda, agricultural land and land uses are registered and monitored by authorities which facilitates decision-making on land use plans and control of the use of land. Data is also available on land uses across the country, increasing the knowledge base usable for decision-makers. As such, more comprehensive land use registration systems and tools for the conditions and the state of land should be used as mechanisms in Greater Accra to improve the efficiency of land use, together with the investment in peripheral but denser urban areas like the satellite cities outside Kigali (Rwanda Ministry of Environment, 2019, pp. 1-3, 6-7; Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority, 2020a, pp. 29-34). Everything considered, this implies that the AMA and EPA are not uncapable per se to evaluate, plan, and implement actions to use land more efficiently, but they would rather need to improve the institutional assets as mentioned above.
Interviewee 1 emphasises that the land use and relevant decision-making leadership composition of not only Kigali but also of Rwanda is strong and well organised. Offering alternative destinations that is the satellite cities and secondary cities for rural-urban migrants by investing in markets in these cities which reflect on their respective resource supply and establishing governmental and educational institutions for employment and other opportunities, rules and policies are strict in balance with voluntary – i.e. people are willing to follow the rules rather than being forced to follow them. Avoiding an oversized, uncontrolled, and over-dimensionally dominant city is thus maintained. Consequently this leads to outcomes of a trajectory of urbanisation of concentrated populations in numerous cities and the capital Kigali which is accompanied by efficient land resource use: resources of a given city region are used for that city’s particular market, and, as also mentioned by Rwanda Ministry of Infrastructure (2015, pp. 17-20, 27-28) uninhabited land is left for non-urban purposes such as agriculture and nature preservation.
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6.4. Actions, motivations, and outcomes
The promotion of urbanisation of cities other than Kigali once Kigali has reached its population limit would create hubs of different sizes across the country which are densely populated but however not gathered in one single location – Kigali. These cities of different population sizes are more controlled than scattered rural residents and leaves space for reforestation and ecological land and therefore the conservation of natural environments. In this way, urbanisation, accompanied by villagization of agricultural workers, facilitates control, as well as the possibility and space to balance urban land with agricultural and ecological land, which in turn means that land is used efficiently by way of urbanisation. Motivations in this case include the recognition of the scarcity of land in Rwanda which holds spatial and natural resources which because of the limited supply ought to be used wisely. Motivations are implicit in the documents used for data and can be understood when one has understood the context and actions (Rwanda Ministry of Environment, 2019, pp. 1-3, 6-7; Bennett, et al., 2018). The environmental problems and stressors of growing informal urbanisation are reportedly being tackled by actions of e.g. rebuilding of these dwellings into more sustainable ones by RISD, and negotiations by local planners and builders to create more affordable but adequate accommodation in these areas, to avoid sprawl. Interviewee 1 mentions the policies of the Master Plan which aim to transform informal urban areas into denser and more sustainable ones, to reduce stressors of informal settlements (Mwai, 25 November 2020; Ntirenganya, 11 December 2020; Bennett, et al., 2018).
Actions are done according to the level of capacity, incentivised by motivations to reach a particular outcome. The actions to improve e.g. the educational capacity of construction professionals include a revision of the education these individuals, and a requirement for them to partake in educational programmes to be eligible to carry out inspections of accommodations. This results in outcomes that include improved quality of houses, and inspectors’ considerations of land suitability and sustainability lead to more efficient and sustainable use of land. As set forth by Bennett, et al. (2018), these outcomes influence the context and provides further capacity. For example, human assets are improved by improving education which enables know-how capacity of building inspectors, which through actions of inspecting buildings with more know-how causes outcomes of improved land use as land- and environmental considerations are taken more into regard. These
43 outcomes can be classified as area coverage and sustainability. The actors responsible for enforcing this action are AMA Dept. of Physical Planning and AMA Works Dept. Motivations for this particular action would be extrinsic: the environmental and land use advantages that include the need to preserve the deteriorating environment to secure the spatial and natural resources it holds, and facilitate the work process on the long term by making it more efficient (Bennett, et al., 2018; Accra Metropolitan Assembly, 2019, pp. 69-73, 82, 90). Interviewee 1 mentions a strategy in Rwanda to avoid forced policies and migration regulations that rarely prove effective, but rather taking on the responsibility of providing alternatives. Hence, urbanisation increases nationally but remains sustainable, land use efficient, and voluntary rather than imposed. Interviewee 1 also emphasises that the preservation of steep slopes and the wetlands in the greater Kigali area is a strategy of the Kigali authorities to regulate land use and preserve the natural environment in greater Kigali. Such actions result in outcomes of area coverage and the sustainability of the natural environment and green spaces. This connects back to the capacity of Rwandan and Kigali authorities that ought to ensure compliance by developers with regulations and reasonable, sensible policies. Compliance with policies thus depends on the capacity of these authorities to ensure that policies are followed. Interviewee 1 also mentions that the strong leadership and clearly outlined, reasonable policies in the land use Master Plan facilitate that such regulations are followed. This is facilitated by the pull-factors that include employment through the establishment of universities and headquarters for government institutions which pull migrants to secondary cities. Subsequently, the pressure on building accommodation, services, and expand the built-up land in general in and around Kigali, is decreased (Bennett, et al., 2018). Based on publications on land use and urbanisation in Ghana, importantly the documents by AMA and EPA, such compliance and urbanisation approaches are far less present in greater Accra, leading to urban sprawl and uncontrolled land use (Accra Metropolitan Assembly, 2019; Yecham Property Consult, 2020; Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2017; Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2015).
The involvement by UN-Habitat in Rwanda after 1994 provided the local stakeholders with financial assets since actions to build up high-quality infrastructure and other projects mentioned in section 5.2.1. were funded by UN-entities. The creation of institutional assets with the aim reach outcomes of improving the Rwanda land and urban leadership were also facilitated by UN-Habitat
44 operations. Thus, it has conributed to the context of Rwandan management of urban areas, urbanisation, and land existing today (Bennett, et al., 2018; Francioni, 2015; Rwanda Ministry of Infrastructure, 2015; City of Kigali, 2020; Rwanda Land Management and Use Authority, 2020a).
It is noteworthy that outcomes of actions and capacities in both Rwanda and Ghana are classified mostly as ecological since the aspect of land use in an urbanisation context predominantly concerns the sustainability of the environment and land resources (Bennett, et al., 2018; Rwanda Ministry of Environment, 2019, pp. vi, 1; Environmental Protection Agency Ghana, 2017, pp. xxxii-xxxiii).
7. Conclusion
The research gap that this study addresses is how local actors, i.e. networks and authorities, in Kigali, Rwanda, compared to Accra, Ghana, can utilise urbanisation for efficient and sustainable use of land and space. The central research question is as follows: ‘What can be done by local actors in Rwanda and Ghana for urbanisation to facilitate the efficiency and sustainability of land use?’. The two other research questions are ‘What makes urbanisation in Rwanda successful?’ and, ‘What can be done in Accra to utilise urbanisation for efficient and sustainable use of land?’. In this chapter, the conclusions on the findings that address the research gap and research questions are provided. This chapter also achieves the research objective by identifying how urbanisation can be utilised for sustainable and efficient use of land.
In sum, local actors in developing countries can utilise urbanisation for efficient and sustainable use of land resources and space by using the following factors: strong leadership of land and urban development, densification, land registers, funding, data availability, housing affordability, ensuring compliance with reasonable policies, urbanisation approaches of alternative city agglomerations and vertical development, upgrading informal settlements, control over the urban environment, and planning and putting plans for land and urban development into practice.
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The abovementioned factors addressing the research gap go hand in hand with the answers to the research questions. Essentially, strong leadership, upgrading informal settlements, data availability, and maintaining records of land registers are central successes of urbanisation in Kigali and Rwanda, and provide directions for what can be done in Accra to utilise urbanisation for efficient and sustainable use of land.
Local actors in greater city areas in developing countries can guide and utilise urbanisation by the use of several factors for efficient and sustainable land resource and space usage. Numerous sources of both Accra, Ghana, and Kigali, Rwanda, indicate that densification, access to data, and institutional capacity, are the main pillars of sustainable urbanisation for efficient use of land. The central conditions for densification are vertical and agglomerated buildings. This physical infrastructure must be robust and sustainable, and housing must be affordable for the average country citizen. This prevents housing unaffordability that contributes to the expansion of uncontrolled, unsustainable, informal urban settlements that in turn intrude upon uninhabited land that otherwise could be used for agriculture or vegetation. Dense but robust urban development thus leaves space for non-urban purposes. Institutional capacity involves the institutions’ and authorities’ ability to carry through actions and the means needed to achieve objectives of urban and environmental sustainability. In Ghana, data availability is meagre and therefore impedes local planning institutions from assessing and planning urban development or transformation. In Rwanda, local institutions are equipped with strong leadership and control, strengthened by maintaining registers of land uses nationally, allowing for planning of land – including reforestation of uninhabited land – and cities.
Pull-factors, including the creation of employment fitting to the local resource supply, in secondary cities other than Kigali are established by Rwanda authorities to avoid overexpansion of Kigali, and allow for plans of urbanisation to alternative cities to take effect without coercion. Urbanisation therethrough enables the control of land in the cities of relatively concentrated populations, as well as the remaining uninhabited and rural land. Concentrating buildings to urban rather than non- urban land to save space further, maintain specific slots of protected, natural land that must not be
46 used for any urban construction, and strict, straightforward, but fair policies that planners and construction developers must comply with, are additional mechanisms.
Funding may have to be provided by external actors such as UN-entities to kick-start sustainable infrastructure and institutions to subsequently maintain control over the land uses (Francioni, 2015).
Interesting topics for future research include urban sustainability in other developing countries in a different context and natural environment, e.g., two developing countries in South America.
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Interviews Interview 1. Architect and Urban Planner, City of Kigali Video-call conducted online 21 December 2020
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Appendices Appendix I. Consent form
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Appendix II. Interview questions
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