Sustainable Service Delivery in an Increasingly Urbanized World

USAID’s Sustainable Urban Services Policy (Policy) provides guidelines to help countries and communities improve the delivery of essential services in urban areas. It emanates from the recognition that unprecedented rates of urbanization are reshaping the nature and geography of global poverty, and seeks to harness the rapid growth of cities to achieve our core development objectives.
By 2030, urban areas worldwide will house an additional 1.4 billion people. Nearly all of this growth will take place in the developing world, and every single country in Africa,Asia and Latin America where USAID has a presence will be impacted by urbanization. The National Intelligence Council identified urbanization as a “tectonic shift” that will “affect how the world works” by 2030. The prospects for achieving our core development objectives are, therefore, tied to what happens in these urban areas.