A home truth: public-private partnerships are key to solving Africa’s housing crisis

Unprecedented urbanisation has led to a serious shortage of affordable housing in cities around the world. In 2014,
Despite the problems facing the housing market, there is cause for optimism. Over the past decade,
Governments have been slow to enact innovative housing policies unless forced to by crisis or dramatic change Global warming, meanwhile, is driving the adoption of eco-friendly construction methods. Developments like this are set to have a significant impact on the industry and may even come to define the next decade of housing in Africa. For that to happen, though, the continent’s policymakers will have to be bolder and much more dynamic. Shaky foundations Today, there is a constant battle between public sector intervention and private sector capacity. The right approach, as with most things, lies somewhere in the middle: public-private partnerships. The private sector neither has the will nor the incentive to take on affordable housing alone, and this is where the government must intervene. Governments, on the other hand, often lack the technical capacity or the systems to deliver affordable housing – areas in which the private sector excels. Fortunately, there are signs that government policy in Africa is starting to catch up with this reality. The Big Four Action Plan – Kenya’s guiding social and economic development policy – has launched an ambitious affordable housing programme, bringing together both the private and public sectors. Equally, Morocco’s social housing programme has reported tremendous success, making it a key reference point for future study, while newly enacted tenant protection laws in Nigeria seem to be making good progress. Unfortunately, governments have been slow to enact innovative policies unless forced to by crisis or dramatic change. Consequently, the push for more affordable housing will most likely have to come from elsewhere. A global problem While a lack of affordable housing is a global problem, the challenge is especially pressing in Africa. The continent’s booming population is expected to almost double by 2030, surpassing 2.5 billion, according to the
Consequently, megacities such as Lagos, Cairo and Kinshasa – each of which already has a population of more than 10 million people – will continue to expand rapidly while other cities, such as Luanda and Johannesburg, will soon join their ranks. This population boom and rapid urbanisation is creating huge housing deficits: according to El-hadj M Bah, Issa Faye and Zekebweliwai F Geh’s open access book,
Estate of mind
Housing policies in Africa are a hangover from the post-colonial era. Many of the major initiatives carried out on the continent were instigated by newly independent African nations and focused on mass housing – particularly for civil servants, who were usually the greatest contributors to the labour force and, therefore, the largest pool of voters. These policies reflected the conventional wisdom of the time, which suggested governments alone could stimulate demand and generate enough supply for housing.
This policy gap cannot and should not be construed as a problem unique to the Global South. The 2008 financial crisis was triggered by the mismanagement of the housing market and the exorbitant price of US homes. Alarmingly, the same trends that caused the crisis are still prevalent today: according to
Housing has always been deeply political, but with the rise of technology – and its ability to coalesce people around a single idea – we can expect to see more social movements emerge in the coming years. It has already had a significant impact in the UK, with The Economist reporting that those who lived in areas with stagnant housing prices were more likely to vote ‘leave’ in the 2016 EU membership referendum.
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