RURAL DEVELOPMENT PROBLEMS IN AFRICA: SOME LESSONS FROM WESTERN NIGERIA

I n an analysis of regional problems within Africa, the frequent imbalance between the geographic distribution of resources and of population suggests that rural development and resettlement will play an increasingly important role in mobilizing the continent's latent resource base. With the almost universally increasing rates of population growth in Africa, pressure for redistribution of people is increasing, most of which manifests itself in accelerating rates of urbanization. But it is also apparent that developing urban areas can only effectively absorb a small proportion of maldistributed population. Therefore national planning programs are increasingly focusing upon the need to reconstruct or to reorientate the economic milieu of rural areas, as is demonstrated by increasing investment in rural development and settlement schemes.