Towards Sustainable Urbanization in Kenya: An Exploration of Homa Bay Town Residents’ Attitudes and Practices

Description

The world is rapidly getting urbanized and towns are becoming important nerve centres for commerce, tourism, education, administration and socio-cultural interaction hubs. Unchecked, unsustainable urban practices can threaten the very existence of the urban settlements. Unsustainable practices such as haphazard dumping of wastes, inequality, ecological pollution, inadequate housing, social conflicts, surges in crime, poor urban transport systems and degradation of environmental quality can rob the urban settlements of their beauty and splendour and instead reduce them to death knells and places of impoverishment. This book explores the less examined factor that will determine sustainability of the urban areas – attitudes and practices. The book explores various aspects of sustainable urbanization and the influence of attitudes on practices towards sustainable urbanization. It provides a rigorous, in depth analysis of linkages between attitudes and practices towards sustainable urbanization and how these varies by knowledge on sustainability, gender, spatial location in an urban area, income levels, and duration of stay in the town among other factors. In the end, the book proposes an integrated model of urban management that takes into account attitudes of residents towards sustainability of the urban area.

This book is timely, bearing in mind the rapid rate of urbanisation in Kenya and the mushrooming social, economic and environmental problems related to this growth. Of importance is that the author considers attitudes and practices of residents of Homa Bay Town in this analysis, since, as he rightly argues, the human factor is most significant in the general direction a town will take on the path to sustainable development [Dr. J. B. Okong’o, School of Arts & Social Sciences, Moi University].

Dr. Okinyi B. Nyawade holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in Geography, a Master of Philosophy degree in Environmental Human Ecology and a Doctor of Philosophy in Geography from Moi University. He is a distinguished academia who has taught geography and environmental science at various public universities. Dr. Okinyi Nyawade has consulted for leading international non-governmental organizations on monitoring and evaluation of projects. Presently, he is the Monitoring and Evaluation and Research Manager for Plan International in Kenya. He has led in the design, implementation and monitoring and evaluation of diverse programs in health, environment, education, water and sanitation among many others. This book is developed from his seminal work on attitudes and practices of residents towards sustainable urbanization in Homa Bay Town.