This paper analyses how sections of the urban population of Accra are coping with poverty. It argues that urban poverty has become a major issue since the implementation of the Structural Adjustment Programmes by the Ghanaian government during the 1980s and the massive migration of rural residents to the city. Accra S infrastructuralfacilities cannot cope with the growing population. The paper focuses on the livelihood strategies employed by households to cope with urban poverty. These inciude increased participation in informal sector activities, employing legal and illegal methods in obtaining essential social services. increased patronage of street food vendors, and multiple membership in social, ethnic and religious associations. Increasing urban poverty also has implications for the division of labour and gender roles within the household. Poor adult men are unable to meet their traditional responsibility of being the household's breadwinners. Women and children are therefore forced to combine their domestic duties with incomegenerating activities in the city s informal sector.