For better or for worse, over the last thirty years, Asian societies that were traditionally rooted in the economy of rice production have been overwhelmed by an unprecedented economic boom. The shift to Asia Within a few decades, a rural exodus on a scale matching the region's economic development and population growth shifted hundreds of millions of peasants to the cities. Their social fabric, habits and culture changed along with their environment. Some figures illustrate this vertiginous dynamic. In 1970, the Asia-Pacific region included only eight cities of more than five million inhabitants.
Today there are more than thirty.
Among the most populous, Bangkok, New Delhi, Calcutta, Seoul, Jakarta, Osaka-Kobe, Manila, Bombay, Madras and Karachi each count at least ten million inhabitants. Beijing has fifteen million and Shanghai twenty million. In only a few years, the city has imposed its primacy everywhere. Those in charge of managing this urban explosion face a formidable and puzzling challenge. However, none of the Asian megacities have stopped growing.