Some call exploita­tive, some say is inspires com­pas­sion. Despite the wide rang­ing opin­ions poverty tourism is a thriv­ing busi­ness in Kenya.

A story in today’s Guardian pro­files a cou­ple of the out­fits that charge tourist to walk through the slums. Writer Xan Rice tagged along with one such tour.

The Dutch tourists came well pre­pared for the walk­ing safari: strong shoes and sun­screen, back­packs and bot­tled water. Ahead lay an after­noon vis­it­ing one of Kenya’s most recog­nis­able sights – but one that rarely fea­tures in tourist brochures.

“It might seem a bit strange to come here,” said Eric Schlangen, as the guide led him towards the sea of tin-roofed shacks that con­sti­tute Kib­era, often described as one of the world’s largest slums. “But I wanted to see how peo­ple live in this coun­try, not just the animals.”

Slum tourism is tak­ing off in Kenya. Sev­eral local organ­i­sa­tions have started sell­ing guided trips through Kib­era, a short drive from the lux­ury hotels that serve most for­eign vis­i­tors in Nairobi.

For about £20, tourists are promised a glimpse into the lives of the hun­dreds of thou­sands of peo­ple crammed into tiny rooms along dirt paths lit­tered with excrement-filled plas­tic bags known as “fly­ing toi­lets”, as one tour agency explains on its website.

While Kib­era has long been an oblig­a­tory stop for for­eign dig­ni­taries and film crews shoot­ing movies such as The Con­stant Gar­dener, its addi­tion to the tourist cir­cuit has stirred debate.

Crit­ics say that unlike town­ship tours in South Africa, which help tell the story of the apartheid strug­gle, Kibera’s sole attrac­tion is its open-sewer poverty – with res­i­dents on parade like ani­mals in a zoo.

“You might argue that it is good for busi­ness and that might be truly so, but it smells,” wrote one critic when one of the first tours began in 2007.

Unpleas­ant whiff aside, the tours have proved pop­u­lar and at least two new oper­a­tors have started up in recent months.

Mar­tin Oduor guided the Dutch group for Kib­era Tours, which promises that its prof­its will stay in the local com­mu­nity. He said that the aim was to human­ise res­i­dents, not degrade them. “We want to demys­tify this place, that it is so dan­ger­ous and sad,” said Oduor as he walked through the slum where he was born and still lives. “Peo­ple are poor, but they have nor­mal lives.”

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