Migration and Urbanization in Burkina Faso. The Impact of Rural Development Policies

Cris Beauchemin, University of Montreal
Bruno Schoumaker, University of Montreal
Bonayi Dabire, University of Ouagadougou
Victor Piché, University of Montreal

Burkina Faso, one of the least urbanized countries in the world, has experienced a rapid urbanization over the last 20 years. The rapid growth of its two cities (Ougadougou and Bobo Dioulasso) is now largely perceived as a problem by the government, and several policies have been set up to limit migration flows to Ouagadougou and Bobo Dioulasso and to develop secondary towns. The objective of this study is threefold: (1) to provide an historical overview of the policies aimed at reducing rural-urban migration flows in Burkina Faso, with a particular emphasis on rural development policies; (2) to retrace the evolution of the urban system and of rural-urban migration flows over the last 30 years; (3) to analyze the relationships between rural development and rural-urban migrations, using unique multilevel longitudinal data on migrations and community development. Classical demographic methods as well as multilevel event history models are used.