Environmental Studies Assignment

Lawish Kumar
20211-30043
Kindly go through the video and identify five the major slum issues and suggest solutions
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqNGh7ORl6g

1. Orangi Town, Karachi, Pakistan

Population: 2.4 million

Asia’s largest slum is believed to be home to around 2.4 million people, although no-one knows
the exact figure. Fed up with living without proper sanitation, residents of Orangi Town gave up
waiting for the government to install sewers and built them by hand themselves. Now more than
90% of Orangi Town’s nearly 8,000 streets and lanes have sewerage pipes all put in by residents.
2. Ciudad Neza, Mexico City, Mexico

Population: 1.2 million

Once a sprawling slum, Ciudad Neza, east of Mexico City, has become more like a suburb thanks
to residents' efforts to build a community and deliver public services. Though still blighted by its
reputation for crime and in need of more schools and local jobs, Neza's bottom-up development
could be a model for other slums. Jose Castillo, an urban planner and architect in Mexico City,
told the Thomson Reuters Foundation: "There's a strong sense of pride in place. It's a community
based on the notion that jointly these people transformed this territory."
3. Dharavi, Mumbai, India

Population: 1 million
In Dharavi, where Slumdog Millionaire was filmed, thousands of small businesses thrive. The
slum has an informal economy with an estimated $1 billion annual turnover. Residents have
opposed attempts to develop Dharavi, which sits on prime real estate in India’s financial capital,
Mumbai. "People think of slums as places of static despair as depicted in films such as Slumdog
Millionaire," said Sanjeev Sanyal, an economist and writer. "If one looks past the open drains and
plastic sheets, one will see that slums are ecosystems buzzing with activity... Creating neat low-
income housing estates will not work unless they allow for many of the messy economic and
social activities that thrive in slums," he said.
4. Kibera, Nairobi, Kenya

Population: 700,000
Kibera, Africa’s largest slum, is just 5km from Nairobi city center. It is home to more than 50,000
children, most of whom go to informal schools set up by residents and churches. Residents have
gone to court to stop the government building a road through Kibera, bulldozing schools and
clinics and thousands of homes.
5. Khayelitsha, Cape Town, South Africa

Population: 400,000
According to the 2011 Census, the townships of Khayelitsha are home to nearly 400,000
residents, 99% of them black. Activists, however, believe that the population is at least three
times bigger and according to a 2012 inquiry into policing in the township, around 12,000
households had no access to toilets. "Using a toilet in informal settlements is one of the most
dangerous activities for residents and women and the children have the biggest problems,"
Axolile Notywala, of the Social Justice Coalition (SJO), a campaign group fighting for better
sanitation in Cape Town's informal settlements, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. “Many
have to share inadequate temporary toilets like porta potties or chemical toilets and have to
walk a long way without light. Others have no access at all and have to use fields or bushes.
Children cannot go alone but finding a parent or neighbour is not always possible for them."