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Sol Nascente (Brazil), March 28 (AP) — The busy main thoroughfare in this impoverished Brazilian neighborhood is packed with people getting off their cars after get off work or grabbing a quick bite. Teenagers take part in open-air rap competitions and gymnastics lessons. Hymns and prayers in small church services continued well into the night.
It’s an ordinary Wednesday in Brazil’s largest favela, or low-income neighborhood. For the first time since poverty, lack of opportunity and economic inequality caused slums to spring up in many cities across the country, this is the first time a Rio de Janeiro favela is not a favela.
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Sol Nascente (Rising Sun in English) is located just 21 miles (34 kilometers) from the capital, Brasilia, in the Federal District, and its per capita GDP is far higher than that of any state in Brazil, highlighting the inequality between the wealthy civil servant community and the area’s residents. .
Since 2010, the number of households in Sol Nascente has increased by 31 percent to more than 32,000, surpassing the Rocinha slum on the slopes of Rio de Janeiro, once Brazil’s most populous, according to preliminary figures from the ongoing census. According to the data, there are nearly 31,000 households in Rosiniya.
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Along Sol Nascente’s unpaved dirt road of self-built homes, and inside the busy shops and restaurants on Main Street, no one welcomed the AP’s new ranking,
“We still need a lot of things, like basic sanitation and infrastructure, but people are better off now. Some even have cars,” said Francisca Célia, a 43-year-old street vendor.
Célia added that despite the challenges, Sol Nascente is not as chaotic or dangerous as the favelas she saw when she visited Rio de Janeiro three years ago. Plus, the available land is much larger.
“This is paradise on earth,” she said.
Sol Nascente’s population growth reflects newcomers looking for cheap or unoccupied land to build homes on, while poor people elsewhere in the Federal District often pay relatively high rents.
Economist Marcelo Neri said it also reflected a surge in populations in working-class neighborhoods across the country, driven by a widespread housing crisis driven by a deep recession and rising rents, the impact of which was ravaged by COVID-19. The epidemic is exacerbated by social researchers at universities and think-tank Getulio Vargas Foundation.
Since the 2010 census, the number of people living in areas the ONS classifies as “subnormal agglomerations” has jumped 40 percent to 16 million, according to preliminary ONS figures reviewed by The Associated Press. Brazil’s overall population grew by less than 9% during this period.
Subnormal agglomerations include not only slums, but also other terms used in Brazil to describe urban areas with irregular settlements and inadequate public services. Residents of Sol Nascente acknowledge that it was once a slum, but told The Associated Press that many parts of the community have grown beyond that term.
According to Cayo Franco, the institute’s geographic coordinator, once most residents have obtained legal title to their property or all basic services are available, the statistical institute no longer considers subnormal gatherings in communities.
The slums also expanded as settlers moved onto uninhabited public and private lands, both steep hillsides and flat lands such as Sol Nascente.
Public transport in Sol Nascente remains poor, with roads that are unpaved, impassable and frequently flooded during the rainy summer months. Only some residents have been given legal property rights, and services are not universally available.
“I paid for electricity, water, taxes, but there was no sewage in front of me, and there was no asphalt,” said Débora Alencar, 39, who found an opportunity to buy land and build a house 15 years ago. Moved to Sol Nascente.
“This is where I get my dignity,” she added.
Alencar runs a collective that provides food, clothing and school supplies to those in need. It also offers vocational training for manicurists and make-up artists, as well as dance and theater classes.
Since 2019, she has also acted as a community representative, negotiating investment matters with the Federal District Government. She said she has made some progress, but not enough.
Theresa Williamson, executive director of Catalytic Communities, a Rio de Janeiro-based nonprofit that studies favelas, said a common feature of favelas is that stigma persists even after residents are given rights and services.
Nayara Miguel is a housewife with two children who lives in a tidy area of Sol Nascente, now with electricity and water, the local government recently laid Streets and public lighting installed, the mood is familiar. The federal government’s Department of Cities has earmarked funds for a housing project there.
“For me, it’s not a slum; it’s a city,” said Miguel, 30. We can go to the hospital, but there are no doctors there to take care of us.”
There are still sheds in the adjacent area. For the past seven years, Bruno Ferreira and his wife have been making a living in the impoverished area of Sol Nascente. They found a place where they could build a one-bedroom house with their own hands to call their own and escape the rent trap.
Ferreira, 39, works odd jobs and his wife has a regular full-time job at the lunch counter. They are raising five children, with a sixth on the way, and saving money to put tiles on their family’s land slab.
Neither want to leave.
“It’s nice here,” he said. “It just lacks the beauty and the legal infrastructure.” (Associated Press)
(This is an unedited and auto-generated story from a Syndicated News feed, the content body may not have been modified or edited by LatestLY staff)
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