African Urban Futures

Imaginaries of African cities that 'leap frog' over fossil-fuel-based cities may seem far-fetched at first, but there are already signs of this starting to happen in various urban experiments around the continent. Instead of looking beyond the continent for solutions, we explore how existing innovations in sustainable infrastructure from African cities can play a role in creating new future orientations.

We do this by bringing promising innovations together in our open access database , and using them as seeds in the co-development of compelling shared 'imaginaries' with African citizens and as a basis for policy-making. Our work explores how existing networks can use imaginaries to think differently and collaborate more effectively in the interest of advancing more sustainable infrastructure in African cities.

By focusing attention on how to improve living conditions for Africa's urban poor in practical and environmentally sustainable ways, and by engaging with high level decision makers about this, we can shift investment and policy to better leverage Africa's rapid urbanisation for more just and sustainable futures.

The project is funded by the Dutch Ministry of Infrastructure and Water Management and started in 2022.