Argentina’s slum policy is a rare bright spot in the country

A visitor strolling down Arroyo, a street in Retiro, one of the poshest neighbourhoods in Buenos Aires, can buy a bag of coffee beans for $22 and order a kale pesto salad at a hip restaurant. But a few streets away is the city’s oldest slum, known as Villa 31, which sprawls across 72 hectares (178 acres) and is home to over 40,000 people. A three-bedroom flat on Arroyo will rent for around $3,000 a month; a family in Villa 31 might pay $150-250 for their lodging. Rather than fancy coffee, street vendors there hawk used trainers and bags of cereal.

Yet though it may not be as glamorous, Villa 31 is catching up. Since 2016 the city government, with funds from the World Bank and the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), has spent more than $300m on paving roads, titling land and laying sewage pipes and electricity cables. The slum used to have only one asphalt road. Today, all streets are paved. In 2016 no public school existed. Now the neighbourhood boasts three. Since 2019 buses go to Villa 31 and a bank has opened there.