While the share of poor people in Sub-Saharan Africa decreased from 56 percent in 1990 to 43 percent in 2012, the region’s rapid population growth outpaced the decrease in poverty, resulting in higher number of poor people than before. More specifically, Africa’s urban population is expected to triple in size in the next half century, which is putting pressure on scarce resources in cities, exacerbated by capacity, budget and governance bottlenecks.

The densely-populated areas with low levels of water and sanitation services pose a serious threat to public health – cholera epidemics have broken out in urban areas in several African countries in recent years. The goals of ending poverty and delivering shared prosperity mean that “frontline” countries – those with the largest deprivations – must be at the center of expanding service delivery. The Democratic Republic of the Congo, with the third highest poverty rate in the world... — blog.wb.org/blogs