The right to housing is guaranteed in many national constitutions, as well as in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and yet 1.6 billion people around the world — one-fifth of the global population — still lack adequate shelter.
The fifth Asia-Pacific Housing Forum, to be held Sept. 1-4 in Hong Kong and hosted by Habitat for Humanity International, will bring together stakeholders and key players from government, development, civil society and the private sector to strengthen cooperation, drive policy change and produce scalable, innovative solutions to low-cost housing issues that affect many of the region’s 1 billion people still living in extreme poverty.
“Many times we talk about the need for health care, proper education and jobs, and those are all important,” Rick Hathaway, HFHI’s vice president for Asia-Pacific, said at a press forum in Manila attended by Devex. “But we all know that that only helps a family to be successful if they’re living in a decent house.”
About the author
Liana Barcia
Liana is a former Manila-based reporter at Devex focusing on education, development finance, and public-private partnerships.
