Urbanization: The role the poor play in urban development

Rapid urbanization is happening across Asia, with more and more people in
need of housing. Providing adequate housing to everyone in our cities is not
an impossible goal. It’s possible to solve the serious housing problems, if we
can begin to see urban poor settlements not as problems, but as sources of
energy and important contributions to the production of housing. And it’s possible
if we can look at the poor not as beneficiaries of someone else’s ideas,
but as the primary actors at the centre of their own development.

There are many factors that are responsible for the shortage of adequate
housing for many people in urban areas. This guide looks at some of the
current trends in urbanization, including rural-urban migration, past efforts to
contain rural-urban migration and the links between urbanization and poverty.
The guide then looks at the state of low-income housing — both formal and
informal — in this urbanizing context. Finally, some housing and land policies
and programmes are examined — both those which have made problems
worse, and those which show a new direction and new opportunities to make
them better.

This guide is not aimed at specialists, but instead aims to help build the capacities
of national and local government officials and policy makers who need to
quickly enhance their understanding of low-income housing issues.