Paper short abstract:

Environmental development in South-West Nigeria is based on overt urbanization to the peril of rural communities. This model of environmental development is fallacious. The paper calls for a balance environmental development of urban and rural spaces to engender sustainable human development.

Paper long abstract:

Human development, viewed holistically, is incomplete without the development of the environment. This is a critical perspective on urbanization and its implications for rural development in South-West of Nigeria. The paper argues that governments in South-West Nigeria, due to political pressure, have concentrated attention on the development of urban spaces to the neglect of rural areas and this has resulted in what can be termed "fallacy of environmental development".

The paper contends that over-concentration of development in urban space in south west, Nigeria has resulted in economic strangulation, political underdevelopment and poor living standard of rural dwellers which have also led to under-utilization of natural resources and unethical approach to environmental development. Urbanity tends to rest on false foundation since there is neutralization of environmental gains built on urbanization due to the saturation of urban space.

The paper submits that there is a need for a reversal of this approach and reinvent the environment in South-West, Nigeria based on ethical, economic, metaphysical, sociopolitical, aesthetic and epistemological perspectives. These perspectives give adequate attention to the rural space alongside the urban space to engender sustainable environmental development.

Keywords: Urbanization, Rural development, South-West Nigeria, Sustainable development.