BAKU, Azerbaijan, May 19. Housing solutions must be integrated with broader legal, planning and social reforms to effectively address the global housing crisis, said Anaclaudia Rossbach, Trend reports.
Speaking Tuesday during a dialogue titled “The Global Housing Crisis: What’s the Agenda for Action?” at the 13th session of the World Urban Forum 13, Rossbach said housing policy cannot be addressed in isolation.
“This is precisely what we discussed at the Open-Ended Working Group on Housing — an important initiative of member states supported by UN-Habitat,” she said. “Housing policy must be integrated with legal, policy and planning reforms.”
Rossbach stressed the importance of effective land governance and land policy, warning that the continued expansion of informal settlements remains a global emergency.
“We are talking about more than one billion people living in informal settlements,” she said. “We need to consider territorial development, understand how space is organized, how secondary and intermediate cities develop, and recognize the scale of the challenges facing megacities and large urban agglomerations.”
She added that housing strategies should be aligned with wider social, economic and climate objectives.
“At the same time, our approach must remain comprehensive and contextualized, linking housing policy with social, economic and climate goals,” Rossbach said.
The third day of World Urban Forum 13 is underway in Baku, where more than 40,000 participants from 182 countries have gathered to discuss sustainable urban development.
The forum’s opening days featured ministerial meetings on the New Urban Agenda, high-level discussions on urban sustainability and the global housing crisis, as well as the inaugural Leaders’ Summit. Organizers also opened the Mexico City pavilion, aimed at strengthening cooperation with Latin America ahead of WUF14.
Held under the theme “Housing for All: Safe and Sustainable Cities and Communities,” the forum runs through May 22 and brings together governments, international organizations, experts and civil society representatives from around the world.
