ABSTRACT
This chapter seeks to provide an overview of the most serious environmental problems in ‘unaffluent urban areas’ to complement Graham Haughton’s overview of environmental problems and affluent cities (Chapter 11). It also considers what factors contribute to or inhibit the reduction of the environmental health risks generally associated with unaffluent urban areas and the extent to which this is achieved by cost and risk transfers – in effect, a consideration of the transitions theme from an environmental health perspective. It highlights the large environmental health burden suffered by a large section of the urban population in low- and middle-income nations, but also considers how middle- and upper-income groups in these urban areas generally avoid these burdens and how they and the more powerful urban-based commercial and industrial enterprises have avoided contributing funding towards their resolution. It also discusses why aid agencies and international development banks have contributed little towards resolving these problems.
