View previous stories
	The global housing crisis is a human rights crisis by Jonathan Reckford, Joseph Muturi IIED, Habitat for Humanity, Slum Dwellers International   Oct. 2023   UN expert urges action to end global affordable housing crisis. (OHCHR)   A UN expert today warned of a severe affordable housing crisis, despite housing being a fundamental human right long recognised under international law.   “The world is grappling with a situation where more and more people are unable to afford their housing costs. Millions lack the financial means to access safe, secure and habitable housing,” said Balakrishnan Rajagopal, the UN Special Rapporteur on the right to adequate housing.   In his report to the UN General Assembly, the expert stressed that thousands of people are evicted every day simply because they cannot pay their housing costs, contributing to rising homelessness.   He noted that a staggering 1.6 billion people around the world lack adequate housing and basic services, with projections that this could rise to 3 billion by 2030. It is estimated that 100 million people worldwide are homeless.   “States, intergovernmental organisations and institutions should make more concerted efforts to address the underlying causes of housing unaffordability,” Rajagopal said. He pointed to several causes, including housing financialisaton, lack of local government authority, and weak tax policies.   In his report, the Special Rapporteur highlighted the ripple effects that occur when people are unable to afford housing, putting their well-being and physical and mental health at risk. “When their rights to security of tenure, livelihoods and access to energy, safe water and sanitation are weakened, it ultimately violates the right to a life in dignity,” Rajagopal said.   The expert outlined concrete steps that States can take to achieve the goal of affordable housing for all. “There is no one-size-fits-all approach to ensuring affordable housing for all, and States should choose options that best suit their specific needs and circumstances,” he said.   “Inclusive participation can tailor responses to different needs,” Rajagopal said. He stressed the importance of pursuing policy and institutional options that hold the promise of better outcomes, including co-housing, land banks, and rent regulation.   The Special Rapporteur warned that the affordable housing crisis does not affect everyone equally, but falls disproportionately on vulnerable groups who already face discrimination.   He urged States to recognise affordability as an integral part of the right to adequate housing in their national or constitutional law, which is lacking in most cases.   “As a global call to action to counteract and prevent the negative effects of the escalating trend towards unaffordable housing, this report should serve as a major catalyst for achieving affordable housing for all,” the expert said.   http://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2023/10/un-expert-urges-action-end-global-affordable-housing-crisis   July 2023   World Leaders need to prioritize the more than 1 Billion People living in Informal Settlements, by Jonathan Reckford - CEO of Habitat for Humanity International and Joseph Muturi - Chair of Slum Dwellers International.   When representatives from dozens of countries gathered recently at the UN High Level Political Forum in New York to share progress on their efforts to achieve the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), this disturbing reality was clear: the world is not even close to meeting the goals by 2030 as intended.   According to the report released at the meeting, progress on more than half of the SDG targets is weak and insufficient, with 30% of targets stalled or in reverse. In particular, progress towards SDG 11, which centers on making “cities inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable” is stagnating, signaling regression for the third year in a row.   Unless governments take urgent action to address the plight of more than 1 billion people struggling daily to survive in slums and other poorly constructed informal settlements, we will not achieve the SDGs.   Access to affordable, safe housing is a fundamental human right, and intrinsically linked to building sustainable and resilient communities. It’s time world leaders turned their attention to improving housing conditions in informal settlements as a critical first step in helping to solve the most pressing development challenges of our time, from health and education to jobs and climate resilience.   Consider Milka Achieng, 31, who lives among the more than 250,000 residents of Kibera, a bustling hub of mud-walled homes and small businesses that make up one of the world’s largest informal settlements on the south side of Nairobi, Kenya.   Every day, Milka heads out for work and walks past the kiosk where she pumps water that isn’t clean enough to drink without boiling. She passes neighbors who live with the constant fear of eviction and the threat of deadly fires sparked by jerry-rigged electrical lines.   Yet despite these conditions, Milka remains upbeat. She works for a Kenya-based startup that, from its production facility in the heart of Kibera, cranks out firesafe housing blocks designed to make homes in informal settlements safer and more resilient. These are the kinds of innovative, scalable solutions that not only hold promise for the future of Kibera, but also for the millions of families struggling to keep their loved ones healthy and safe in informal communities around the globe.   By 2050, nearly 70% of the world’s population is expected to live in urban areas, making the proliferation of informal settlements inevitable – unless world governments take bold, collective action.   A new report reveals the incredible, transformational benefits – in terms of health, education, and income – if world leaders invest in upgrading housing in informal settlements.   The International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) modeling from 102 low- and middle-income countries shows that if people living in informal settlements gained access to adequate housing, the average life span would jump 2.4 years on average globally, saving 730,000 lives each year.   This translates to more deaths prevented than if malaria were to be eliminated. The report also found that as many as 41.6 million additional children would be enrolled in school worldwide.   Economic growth, meanwhile, would jump by as much as 10.5% in some countries, whether measured as GDP or gross national income per capita. The resulting increase in living standards would exceed the projected cost of improving informal settlements in many countries.   These findings provide a long-overdue wake-up call to governments and municipal authorities that prioritizing safe and secure housing would have far-reaching implications for advancing not just community wellbeing, but national and global economic prosperity.   World leaders who don’t prioritize improving informal settlements are making a grave mistake. Their goals related to education, health, and other areas of human wellbeing hinge on how well the world responds to trends such as growing inequities, rapid urbanization, and a worsening global housing crisis.   As the heads of an international housing organization and a global network of slum dwellers, respectively, we believe governments have an urgent responsibility to invest in comprehensive solutions to our global housing crisis.   This includes supporting start-ups, such as Milka’s factory, which are pioneering innovative, low-cost, and community-driven solutions to strengthen the foundation of unsafe housing settlements worldwide.   Simultaneously, officials at the global, national and municipals levels must ensure that residents have land tenure security, climate-resilient homes, and basic services such as clean water and sanitation.   Importantly, IIED researchers also concluded that, while they couldn’t put a precise number on it, the rehabilitation of informal settlements would have a clear and positive “spillover effect” by strengthening environmental, political and health care systems for all. This, in turn, would improve overall societal wellbeing for generations to come.   Upgrading the world’s supply of adequate housing is a lever for equitable human development and a cornerstone for sustainable urban development. Global, national and community stakeholders must join forces with the more than 1 billion voices clamoring for greater access to safe and secure homes.   When residents of informal settlements do better, everyone does better. Strikingly, it’s that simple.   * IIED Home Equal report: http://tinyurl.com/2fvn7hp2   http://www.habitat.org/ap/home-equals-ap http://www.iied.org/better-for-everyone-exposing-hidden-value-equitable-housing-informal-settlements http://www.iied.org/tag/informal-settlements-slums http://sdinet.org/ http://www.ohchr.org/en/press-releases/2023/01/states-obligated-safeguard-equitable-access-and-use-land-un-committee http://www.ohchr.org/en/special-procedures/sr-housing/annual-thematic-reports Visit the related web page
	Reducing inequalities for food security and nutrition by Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition United Nations Committee on World Food Security   June 2023   The High Level Panel of Experts on Food Security and Nutrition (HLPE-FSN) of the United Nations Committee on World Food Security (CFS) has launched its flagship report on “Reducing inequalities for food security and nutrition”.   Despite significant progress in reducing global poverty, food insecurity and malnutrition over the past decades, the world continues to grapple with the alarming increase in hunger and malnutrition. The launch of this report comes at a crucial time and highlights the urgent need to address inequalities for food security and nutrition (FSN), and their devastating impact on communities worldwide.   The consequences of such inequalities are far-reaching, diminishing people's life chances, hampering productivity, perpetuating poverty, and impeding economic growth. Unequal food security and nutrition outcomes have even sparked political unrest, eventually leading to protests and food riots.   Inequalities in food security and nutrition, between countries and regions and within countries, communities and households, exist throughout the world. This report provides a conceptual framework for assessing inequalities in food security and nutrition, the inequalities within and outside food systems that underpin them, and the systemic drivers of such inequalities.   The report highlights the ethical, socioeconomic, legal and practical imperatives for addressing these inequalities. It emphasizes that food is a fundamental human right and that inequalities in food security and nutrition undermine this right.   In addition, by applying an intersectional understanding of inequalities – that is, considering the cumulative effects of multiple interacting inequalities on marginalized peoples – the report contributes to a more inclusive understanding and sustainable action to reduce food security and nutrition inequalities.   The report proposes a set of measures to reduce inequalities, both within and beyond food systems. It emphasizes the need for a transformative agenda, aiming for structural change towards equity.   By providing actionable recommendations addressing the systemic drivers of food security and nutrition and advocating for actions in favour of equity and equality, the report contributes to global efforts towards achieving food security and improving overall well-being, leaving no one behind.   http://www.fao.org/cfs/cfs-hlpe/insights/news-insights/news-detail/reducing-inequalities-for-food-security-and-nutrition/en Visit the related web page
	View more stories