Slums in Shangai-China

Today, Shanghai has among the worst slums in China. The housing was built decades ago by refugees from war and destitute peasants fleeing intolerable conditions in the countryside. But Shanghai, intent on burying this past, is now methodically bulldozing slum areas around the city as it builds new six-story concrete apartment blocks.

Shanghai's housing problems are not singular to this country's cities. In November, a nationwide survey of housing, a first, found that more than 10 million urban homes were substandard - being too small, lacking either running water or an indoor kitchen and having no toilets. The survey also found that 330,000 urban families were homeless.

In Putuo, the houses, stacked crazily against one another like a child's wooden blocks, have no plumbing or kitchens. Above all, they are small.
For Shanghai, the slums like Putuo are only the worst facet of an almost overwhelming housing crisis for a city bursting at the seams with 12 million people. According to the city planning department, Shanghai needs to double its housing stock.

''A lot of people are living in poor conditions,'' said Xu Rending, an official with the city's Housing Administration Bureau. ''There are several reasons for this. First, everybody relies on the Government to build houses. Factories and work places aren't building enough houses. Second, the Government cannot afford to build enough housing. And third, the money people pay for houses is very small.'' #10% of Housing Substandard Not only is there not enough housing, more than 10 percent of the existing stock is considered substandard, according to planning officials. Estimates vary among city agencies over the average living space for Shanghai residents, but most data suggest an average living area of 43 to 58 square feet for every resident. The national goal is to build enough urban housing by 1990 so that city dwellers will all have at least 64 square feet of housing space.