ABSTRACT
One out of every three people living in cities of the developing world lives in a slum. UN-HABITAT estimates indicate that in 2005, more than half of the world’s slum population resided in Asia, followed by sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean. Slum prevalence – or the proportion of people living in slum conditions in urban areas – is highest in sub-Saharan Africa; 62 per cent of the region’s urban population lives in a slum or suffers from one or more of the five shelter deprivations that define a slum. In Asia, slum prevalence varies from a high of 43 per cent in Southern Asia to a low of 24 per cent in Western Asia, while in Latin America and the Caribbean, 27 per cent of the urban population was classified as living in slum conditions in 2005. 1
