• The role of Department of Rural Development ( DRD) is to facilitate the development, maintenance and sustainable management of urban, peri-urban and rural infrastructure to enhance the delivery of social services to the people of Zambia.
• Services are delivered through Local Authorities (LAs) in partnership with the private sector.

Goal of DRD

• To work with and through key players and stakeholders – LAs, CPs, NGOs, etc., in ensuring provision of quality municipal infrastructure throughout Zambia by providing: adequate coordination; professional technical advice; mobilisation of resources; monitoring and evaluation of municipal infrastructure.

Policies and Acts

The Following are some of the Policies and Acts Relevant to DRD:

1. The Local Government Act National Housing Policy:  This policy is currently undergoing review; –

1. The Markets and Bus Stations Act No. 7 of 2007; providing for formation of market boards, establishment of the markets and bus station fund and management of markets and bus stations by Las;
2. The National Fire and Rescue Services Policy (Draft).

Other Relevant Policies & Acts

1. Transport Policy under MCT
2. Public Roads Act No. 12. 2002 under MWS
3. National Road Fund Act No. 13. 2002
4. Public Health Act under MOH
5. ZEMA

Units under DRD

The department has four units as indicated below;

1. Urban and Feeder Roads;
2. Markets and Bus Stations;
3. Fire and Rescue Services and;
4. Solid Waste Management.

The Department facilitates the planning and sourcing of funds for the care and maintenance of urban and feeder roads including community access roads in the country. The Public Roads Act and Government Gazette Number 836 of 2016 gives the mandate of maintaining urban, feeder and community roads to the Local Authorities (Councils).

• Provision of modern Markets and Bus Station infrastructure help improve the quality of lives for our marketeers. Approximately 80 percent of our marketeers are women and improving their trading places will help reduce poverty. The programme of constructing markets and Bus station infrastructure help Local Authorities generate income from market levies. The programme also helps in formalising informal trading such that it would be easy for government and other financial institutions to provide financial services.
• The Ministry of Local Government is in the process of operationalising the recently established Markets and Bus Station Fund. The fund will be used for the rehabilitation of existing and construction of modern markets and Bus Station infrastructure.
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• Zambian has only six properly built Fire Stations namely Livingstone, Kafue, Lusaka, Kabwe, Ndola and Kitwe. These Fire Stations were built during colonial era (1950s) and were ideal at that time. Later in 1968 a Central National Fire Service Training School was established to provide training for the same local fire authority’ Brigades and private companies which included the mines.
• This training school is in operation and is situated in Kabwe, Central Province. Due to the growing demand for fire services around the country, the Fire Service School is unable to provide the needed training to firefighters due to lack of training facilities and space.  In view of the above, the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development is in the process of procuring works on a finance and build basis of a new modern National Fire and Rescue Services Training School and eleven (11) Provincial Fire Stations. The proposed School will be equipped with modern technology to enhance the skills of our firefighters. The Provincial Fire stations will include sizeable compound for firefighters for easy mobilization of Fire and Rescue Services

• The Ministry is responsible for Solid Waste Management in Zambia. The service provision is implemented by the Local Authorities (LAs) via mandates under the Local Government Act (1991). Additionally, the Statutory Instrument (SI) No. 100 of 2012, Solid Waste Management Regulations provides for the participation of private sector with delegated responsibility from the LAs. To achieve its mandate, the Ministry is formulating a National Policy for Solid Waste Management to elaborate and strengthen the policy, legal, regulatory and institutional frameworks for efficient and reliable delivery of service provision in Zambia.
• The Government of the Republic of Zambia (GRZ) through the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development (MLGRD) is committed to addressing the many challenges of solid waste that are critical to the health and safety of the Zambian citizenry. This is being addressed though the creation of a Solid Waste Management Utility for enhanced service provision, clean cities clean and better public health. The creation of a utility will significantly curtail garbage induced disease outbreaks, maintain the drainages and public places free of debris and litter.
• The utility will also achieve satisfactory service provision, and the levels of services required for protection of public health and the environment. The direction that has been take is in consistency with the recent Government policy manifested by the cleaning of streets and relocation of traders to designated trading places across the Zambia.