In the last 15 years Tanzania has experienced a dramatic population
flow to urban areas, especially to intermediate towns. It is, however,
difficult to identify the economic benefits of urban migration for village
people. Urban living costs are increasing and wages are fixed by
the government without taking rising prices into account. The cost of
housing and of urban services and facilities such as water have escalated,
while employment opportunities have been severely reduced,
partiyas a result of increasing competition between job-seeking
migrants.
Why do village people migrate to urban areas? How do they finance
urban accommodation? And what kinds of survival strategies
are developed?
Urban migration is basically motivated by an expected inerease in
standard of living, but fulfilment of this expectation is complicated.
To migrate and establish urban residence in Tanzania requires surplus
resources. To understand this issue, we need to consider the nature
of social relations (extended family and friendship ties), and cultural
relations (ethnic group obligations and home village ties) which
provide access to urban and rural resources, for example, food production,
petty trade, small-scale manufacturing, wage labour and
other kinds of income-generating activities.
As the economies of less developed countries dec1ined during the
1980s (Simon, 1990), there was evidence that the rural-urban income
gap was narrowing considerably and that urban unemployment was
increasing (Jamal and Weeks, 1988).