{"id":931,"date":"2017-05-06T00:00:09","date_gmt":"2017-05-06T00:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/?p=931"},"modified":"2017-05-04T14:29:27","modified_gmt":"2017-05-04T14:29:27","slug":"mwr-impacts-urbanisation-ledcs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/making-work-real\/2017\/05\/mwr-impacts-urbanisation-ledcs\/","title":{"rendered":"MWR: The Impacts of Urbanisation in LEDCs"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Sean<\/a>
Sean Grobler, first year student at Southampton Business School, discusses how urbanisation affects LEDCs.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cRapid urbanisation is arguably the most complex and important socio-economic phenomenon of the 20th<\/sup> Century\u201d (Allen & You, 2002, p3) which is exemplified in 2009 – the urban population surpassed the rural population for the first time ever (UN,2009). Having over half the population live in urban areas can result in sanitation, hygiene and environmental issues, all of which pose a threat to people and business.<\/p>\n

The origins of urbanisation date back to the beginning of the Industrial Revolution where much of the western world underwent rapid population growth. People were lifted out of what Malthus (1798) described as the \u201cMalthusian Trap\u201d and for the first time ever Britain underwent exponential growth in population. At first, Britain was reaping the rewards of this increased size of workforce and efficiency which can be seen in Figure 1 by Clark (2009,p2). The Industrial Revolution was a pivotal point for Britons as this marked a time in history where for the first time ever, there was a growth in industry and disposable income.<\/p>\n

\"Figure<\/a>
Figure 1<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Urbanisation is still a current process, with the proportion of urban dwellers expecting to reach 70% by 2050 (OECD and Foundation, 2010), many of whom will be in less economically developed countries known as LEDCs. With such fluctuations in populations, there is no doubt that this will result in socio-economic and environmental impacts as seen in Figure 2 by Akshay (2014). The problem is, the LEDCs (where urbanisation is happening fastest), are the nation’s least suited to cope with the impacts. Here we see the stereotypical issues one can expect to see with rapid urbanisation, especially in developing nations such as India and China, like overcrowding, hygiene issues, and pollution \u2013 these are all issues that stunt the ” growth of business.”<\/p>\n

\"Figure<\/a>
Figure 2<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Within these urbanised and poverty stricken nations, there is a huge polarisation of wealth and business which is apparent in Figure 3 from Chineseprinter (2011). It shows Dharavi (India\u2019s largest slum) with Mumbai (India\u2019s financial capital) metres away from one another. One would assume that the slum (Dharavi) would have a less thriving economy compared to Mumbai due to the fact it operates in the informal sector, with most businesses consisting of shoe shiners, traders, and cleaners.<\/p>\n

\"Figure<\/a>
Figure 3<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

However, something that surprised me was that despite average daily income being $2-4 (Economist, 2005), Dharavi is a strong contender against Central Mumbai. Why? Because where Central Mumbai lacks in a cultural and diverse economy, this is where Dharavi succeeds. In fact, Prince Charles (2009) famously compared Dharavi to Britain and said that Britain had much to learn from the diversity and happiness within the slum. Alongside this happiness and despite being a slum, Dharavi produces over $500m of goods a year (Economist,2005) which is an incredible statistic. I think Dharavi perfectly exemplifies how urbanisation can result in numerous issues but if managed correctly, even a slum and its businesses can turn this issue into something of financial benefit.<\/p>\n

Sean Grobler studies Business Management at Southampton Business School. The views in this article are those of the author. This article is part of our \u2018Making Work Real\u2019 series. <\/em><\/strong><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cRapid urbanisation is arguably the most complex and important socio-economic phenomenon of the 20th Century\u201d (Allen & You, 2002, p3) which is exemplified in 2009 – the urban population surpassed the rural population for the first time ever (UN,2009). Having over half the population live in urban areas can result in sanitation, hygiene and environmental issues, all of which pose …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":99275,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1030568],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-931","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-making-work-real","column","threecol"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/99275"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=931"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":937,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/931\/revisions\/937"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=931"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=931"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.soton.ac.uk\/bscbusinessmanagement\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=931"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}