Housing the poor: The task ahead in developing countries

Abstract

The urbanization process in developing countries is proceeding at an unprecedented rate. Over the next 25 years, over 10 9 newcomers, about twice as many as during the past 25 years, will have to be absorbed by the towns and cities and be employed in non-farm occupations. Most of these newcomers will be poor and unskilled. The developing countries are not ready for this task ahead—in terms of attitudes, policies, institutions or resource mobilization. The objective of any responsible urban strategy must be to increase the capacity of towns to absorb and employ these poor newcomers, efficiently and productively. For many national and city authorities this formulation of objectives will involve a major attitudinal shift, away from architectural and city-oriented preoccupations toward a people-oriented set of concerns. A proper urban strategy would impact on all sectors: housing, land, transport, utilities, education, health and manufacturing, and on commerce in both the formal and informal sectors. This paper addresses housing which is one of the key sectors. The housing situation in rapidly urbanizing areas of the developing world is very poor and deteriorating. Typically 40% and in many cases 75%, of the population of fast growing cities is densely housed in squatter settlements without basic services. This proliferation of squatter settlements results from the failure of housing policy. The failure to generate sufficient financial resources to meet the infrastructure demands creates shortages which impact systematically on the poor. Unrealistically high standards in housing, zoning and public services means that the scarce resources produce fewer units at costs beyond the means of the mass of the people. Administrative and conventional barriers stand in the way of the poor gaining access to secure land tenure and credit which are essential to housing. The situation is enormously aggravated in some cases by governments which actually demolish the low standard illegal housing to which poor people in the circumstances must resort. The experience with public housing, typically rented to low-income families at highly subsidized rates, has been alarmingly bad in virtually every country. What are the key elements of a more promising approach? First, a fundamental element is the decision to try to absorb the newcomers rather than to throw barriers in the way of their integration. Second, national housing policy must be based upon what the national economy and the people can afford, otherwise, the policy cannot produce housing on a scale commensurate with demand and the poor will always be excluded. The approach that the World Bank has come to believe has the most promise of success could be described as “basic urbanization” and has two complementary thrust—the upgrading of existing slums instead of their demolition or “clearance”, and the development of new land at very basic, affordable, service levels which can be improved over time as family income increases. Both of these approaches depend upon provision of secure tenure or occupancy rights and relatively long-term credit. Public paticipation, self-help, community development and employment creation are also important features. These approaches have now been tested for large-scale replication in a number of very interesting projects, which are described briefly in the paper.