Rio''s Favelas
In a low-wage economy, and without even half-decent social services, life is extremely difficult for the majority of Brazilians. During the last thirty years the rural poor have descended on urban centres in search of a livelihood. Unable to find accommodation, or pay rent, they have established shantytowns, or favelas , on any available empty space, which in Rio usually means the slopes of the hills around which the city has grown. They start off as huddles of cardboard boxes and plastic sheeting, and slowly expand and transform as metal sheeting and bricks provide more solid shelters. Clinging to the sides of Rio's hills, and glistening in the sun, they can from a distance appear not unlike a medieval Spanish hamlet, perched secure atop a mountain. It is, however, a spurious beauty. The favelas are creations of need, and their inhabitants are engaged in an immense daily struggle for survival, worsened by the prospect of landslides caused by heavy rains, tearing their dwellings from their tenuous hold on precipitous inclines. However, life for Rio's favela dwellers is beginning to change for the better. Bound together by their shared poverty and exclusion from effective citizenship, the favelados display a great resourcefulness and co-operative strength. Self-help initiatives - some of which are based around the escolas de samba that are mainly favela -based - have emerged, and the authorities are finally recognizing the legitimacy of favelas by promoting " favela-bairro " projects aimed at fully integrating them into city life. Private enterprise, too, is beginning to take an interest as it becomes alert to the fact that the 22 percent of the city's population that live in favelas represent a vast, untapped market.
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