THE COMING BOOM:

Afghanistan Faced with Severe Housing Shortage (Anuj Chopra, 18 Oct 2007, World Politics Review)

Six years after the invasion, ask ordinary Afghans the biggest challenge they face, and their answer isn't likely to be the Taliban. It is, in fact, to find a roof over their heads.

Kabul is in particular need, because of the destruction of nearly 70,000 houses in almost thirty years of war. And a steady inflow of returnees has further exacerbated the problem. With a population of 800,000 before the U.S.-led invasion in 2001, Kabul is now home to over four million, many of them refugees that have returned home since the fall of the Taliban. It is estimated that as much as half of Kabul's population lives in squatter settlements.

The city is sinking under the weight of its own citizens. Kabul 's most urgent urban planning issues are linked to its rapid population growth.

The situation is the same in other larger cities as well -- like Jalalabad, Mazar-e-Sharif and Kandahar. According to U.N. estimates, from 2000 to 2015 the national population is expected to increase by 14 million to a total of about 37 million; more than half of this growth will be in urban areas.

So far, foreign firms have invested $4.5 billion in rebuilding Afghanistan, but very little of it has gone into housing construction, according to Omar Zakhilwal, the director of the Afghanistan Investment support Agency (AISA) in Kabul.