Since 1989 Vietnam has been undergoing a process of re-engagement with the world economy. This liberalization process (doi moi) has been heavily concentrated on the two main cities of Vietnam, Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City and despite the Vietnamese being eager to avoid the creation of another Bangkok, with all of its environmental and social problems, the sustainability of the present urban-based economic growth is under threat. In many ways, this threat is disguised by inadequacies in the data base on urban population, which has in turn led to an official underestimation of the extent of some of the social and economic problems being faced by individual households. This paper examines the nature of this growth and contends that the present size of Ho Chi Minh City and Hanoi are much greater than official figures suggest. II then goes on to review the situation with regard to urban poverty, basic needs and the environment to illustrate the extent to which this unacknowledged growth is not only threatening the sustained expansion of those cities, but also the sustainability of the economic growth on which the country is so reliant. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.
