His new powers extend beyond relief and reconstruction to cover areas including infrastructure, banking and finance, rural and urban land use, telecommunications, defence and security.

BBC: Venezuela parliament gives Hugo Chavez more powers

If the Department of the Environment's estimate that, under current land-use patterns, 169, 400 hectares will go from rural to urban use by 2016 is correct, the proportion of England that is considered urban would increase 1.3 percentage points, to 11.9%.

ECONOMIST: Housing