Announcements

Combating extreme-poverty (SDG1) and mitigating climate (SDG 13) change could currently be considered as two of the most urgent challenges for global sustainable development. The population in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) is rapidly growing which leads to an increasing need for housing. Affordable housing in SSA is already a huge challenge, especially for low-income households. Uganda, for example, has – according to Uganda Bureau of Statistics – a housing deficit of approximately 2.1 million housing units. The deficit is currently growing at an annual rate of 200,000 units. The development in most other countries in SSA such as Nigeria, Tanzania and Kenya follows similar patterns. As housing is a human right, providing shelter to the growing populations is a necessity and there is a need of stopping and reversing the current trend of increased scarcity of housing. It is important to find a way of securing access to affordable housing and simultaneously minimize the associated environmental impact. Globally, the building process, when described as the value chain that goes from cement and concrete raw materials over construction and use of buildings to demolition, is responsible for some 30-40% of global man-made carbon emissions. How we build and how we use buildings have significant impact on climate change. Globally, affordability and carbon neutrality are among the most important aspects of sustainable building. Focus in the developed world is on carbon emissions more than affordability where the opposite is valid for developing countries. In sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) and in places like Bukoba, the main sustainability issue with building is affordability. A significant part of building is residential building.

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