This document is on the improvement and development of unplanned settlements and slum areas of the city of Dar es Salaam, the capital of Tanzania. It deals with strategic elements for the upgrading of unplanned and unserved settlements and institutional roles and responsibilities for the implementation of the arrangements worked out in this paper. The city is the largest metropolitan area in the United Republic of Tanzania and is its economic capital. Its current population of 3 million is expected to grow to 3.8 million by 2015, i.e. at a growth rate of 4 percent per annum (in other words, each year 100,000 persons are added to the city’s population). As experienced in Lagos and Nairobi, Dar es Salaam has grown tenfold over the past 40 years. Between 1970 and 2007, the population grew from 360,000 to 3 million people. Seventy percent of the city’s residents live in unplanned, poorly serviced settlements with inadequate housing. Fifty percent of residential land (5,000 hectares) is unplanned and this area accommodates 2 million people. The average density is 400 persons per hectare.