Wetland gentrification: the African variant on ecological gentrification

There is growing scholarly interest in notions of ecological gentrification – whereby environmental improvements drive up real estate prices, with the subsequent displacement of low-income residents – particularly in the global North. Drawing on an integrative review of extant literature on African urbanism, urban greenery encroachment and gentrification, this paper argues that the Western notion of ecological gentrification has little or no application in African cities, which are confronted with rapid encroachment on urban wetlands amidst burgeoning urbanization and its attendant increasing demand for property development. We conceptualize the African variant on ecological gentrification as “wetland gentrification”. It occurs when land scarcity and rising property values in African cities cause indiscriminate depletion of urban wetlands for property development, leading to the destruction of ecological resources and displacement of human populations. This paper discusses, among other topics, the implications of wetland gentrification for urban governance and vice versa.