by Algy Moncrieff

Created on: January 10, 2007   Last Updated: July 08, 2009

Everywhere in the world populations are growing, and although the rate is slowing in the developed world, it can still cause problems in many areas. In the poorer countries of the developing world, population growth, poverty and environmental degradation are linked in a vicious circle with environmental degradation worsening poverty, which in turn makes it harder for a country to achieve the economic growth that, in the long run, will help to empower women, improve education, and reduce population growth. The cycle can be broken free from, but the environmental degradation will tend to continue unabated, potentially even worsening as a country becomes industrialised. To reconcile these problems, policymakers must perform a delicate balancing act.

More population puts a greater strain on the government to provide for them - not only in welfare such as the NHS in Britain, but also in simply finding room for all the excess people. Here in Britain we have it bad enough, with rapidly increasing demand for houses causing prices to rise rapidly, but in less economically developed countries the problem is far, far worse.

As the population grows, particularly in newly industrialised countries, in a desperate attempt to find work people migrate to the cities; but there is no room. The cities, such as Rio de Janeiro and Kolkata (Calcutta) to give two famous examples, simply do not have the housing to cope with so many hopeful migrants. People have two choices - live on the streets (the advantage of this being they are near their place of work in the inner city) or take up residence in a shanty town, building a makeshift house out of corrugated iron, planks of wood, or even cardboard.

The conditions in shanty towns are horrific - rarely is there anything other than open sewerage, no electricity or gas, and rife crime. The unfortunate migrants get even poorer, with difficulty in simply surviving, let alone managing to earn a half decent income. Even so, it is a better life than in the countryside where they came from; there they had almost nothing at all. At least in the city they can survive, and a lucky few may even earn a reasonable wage.

Unsurprisingly the shanty towns are a serious environmental concern. As more and more people arrive at the city, the shanty towns on the outskirts enlarge, spreading outwards and eating into the countryside. Deforestation to light fires and clear space for housing destroys the local flora, and the local fauna that used

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