Sewers and urbanisation in developing countries: The case of Tanzania
This policy brief, focused on Tanzania, presents findings from a research project examining the impacts of sewer access in 92 cities across five developing countries.
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McCulloch-et-al-Policy-Brief-May-2025-Tanzania.pdf
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- This study finds that providing sewer access to an extra 1% of neighbourhood households increases neighbourhood population density by about 6%.
- Changes in neighbourhood sewer access do not have significant effects on neighbourhood mean income or literacy rate.
- Improved sewer access benefits people with demographic characteristics like those of incumbent residents.
- The effect of sewer access on urban form and density is about as important as large transportation infrastructure projects.
- Rural residents can often double or triple their incomes by moving to the city, and peripheral urban residents can often increase their incomes by moving closer to the centre of the city.
- By making higher residential densities tolerable, sewers can permit more people to access high-wage urban jobs.
- Decisions about sewer expansions should consider these benefits in addition to the public health benefits of sewers.
This policy brief forms part of a series on sewers and urbanisation in developing countries, with case studies of Brazil, Colombia, Tanzania, Jordan, and South Africa. Go to Sewers and informal settlements in cities in developing countries to find the same methodology applied to these different country contexts.