Fewer of the poorest quintile (20 per cent) of households have access to social protection in urban areas (16.6 per cent) than in rural areas (23.4 per cent) (World Bank 2018). Although income poverty rates are generally lower in urban areas, poverty is more complex and multidimensional than in rural areas, and the numbers of poor urban households are rising constantly, along with urbanization rates. According to ILO (2017), only 35 per cent of children worldwide enjoy effective access to social protection, with almost 1.3 billion children not covered, most of whom live in Africa and Asia. This implies that the need for tailored social protection for the urban poor is increasing and that the introduction of a child lens to urban social protection is also required.