ABSTRACT
The first UN Global Report on Human Settlements of 1986 (UNCHS, 1987) offers the following bleak summary of the situation:
There is little evidence in the majority of developing countries to suggest that…human settlements situations, in either urban or rural areas, are being impro ved. The picture that emerges is one of a challenge not being met and of governments losing ground in their efforts to meet it. When demographic and urbanisation trends are imposed on the present human settlements situation and the conditions which prevail in cities, towns and villages, the problems take on forms which threaten to become unmanageable.
