A growing population of the world lives in cities, often in informal areas crowded with makeshift dwellings that lack basic utilities.

By and for the community

AVSI has sought to address this through projects to upgrade informal urban areas, integrating two components: physical infrastructure rehabilitation and socioeconomic support for the community in order to build human and social capital necessary for sustainability over the long-term. Both components always give priority to a participatory approach, supporting and strengthening local associations, intermediary bodies, public and private providers serving these areas, promoting their integration into the surrounding city.

Scaling up and South-South success

National governments and global institutions engaged in urban revitalization, including Cities Alliance, the World Bank and the European Union, have recognized AVSI's work and methodology of intensive community participation at all stages of the complex programming effort. As a result, fruitful collaboration with a range of stakeholders has led to considerable scaling-up of existing programs and replication in other regions and countries, in a promising example of South-South cooperation.

A.  Technical assistance to large-scale government urban planning using community participatory approach

 Brazil, Mozambique

B.  Planning and implementation of physical infrastructure improvements at the community level, including housing rehabilitation and support for property and land tenure rights issues.

 Brazil, Haiti, Peru

AVSI Resources related to Urban Upgrading

• What Kind of Urbanization?: Facing the Challenge of Inclusion [PDF]

Presentation given by AVSI’s Fabrizio Pellicelli in South Africa in 2011

•  The Human Being at the Core of Development Policies [PDF]

Presentation from 2009 G8 in Rome, Italy, highlighting educational components of urban upgrading interventions in Bahia State in Brazil

• Pobreza y Patrimônio: A Comunidade do Planalto II. [PDF]

Printed in Italian and Portuguese, this volume presents issues of poverty and the inherent human potential that exists even within situations of poverty with an in-depth look at one community in Brazil and the experiences of AVSI there.