This is the third edition of UN-Habitat’s Policy, Legislation and Governance Section Annual Report. The report demonstrates the Section’s position within UN-Habitat’s strategic context, and also links this area of work to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the New Urban Agenda. The report provides insights into our initiatives and collaborative efforts with all our partners, and presents progress made and results achieved in 2022. It presents these achievements along four focus areas…

This study identifies formal and nonformal land professionals’ categories, their current functions and the additional roles that they would need to take up to improve land governance and establish functioning and fit-for-purpose land administration systems in the Arab region. The study highlights the common challenges faced by land professionals and takes stock of their current capacities, the additional capacities they would need, and the interventions that would enable them to adequately play…

More than 1.8 billion people worldwide lack adequate housing and the number of people living in informal settlements has passed a billion. Housing is a fundamental human right and UN-Habitat recognizes its catalyst role in the sustainable development agenda. ‘Housing at the centre’, a global approach set out by UN-Habitat in 2015, puts people and human rights at the foreground of sustainable urban development policies to leave no one and no place behind. A more coherent and comprehensive…

UN-Habitat provides technical assistance and advisory services to member states in legal reform processes to bring about social and economic transformation and enhance effective service delivery for sustainable urban development. Benchmarking case studies and comparative analysis are key aspects of the UN-Habitat methodology for legal and governance reform. UN-Habitat and the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies at the University of London, UK developed this comparative analysis of housing laws…

This report is based on a study designed to establish prevailing socio-economic conditions, the nature of businesses and the local economic development in the Dadaab area, and the trends of urbanization in Garissa County, Kenya. This report is focused on Households’ Socio-Economic Conditions, utilities and basic services assessments and Businesses and Local Economic Development (LED) in Dadaab, the report concludes with key recommendations

Urban legislation is an important development tool for urban growth as it provides a framework in which to mediate and balance competing public and private interests, especially in relation to land use and development; creates a stable and predictable framework for public and private sector action; guarantees the inclusion of the interests of vulnerable groups; and provides a catalyst for local and national discourse.

Parliaments are the main branch of government with the…

UN-Habitat, the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung Regional Programme Energy Security and Climate Change in Sub-Saharan Africa (KAS), and the University of Michigan (United States of America), through the project on Urban Law for Resilient and Low Carbon Urban Development in Malawi, Namibia, and Zimbabwe, were able to assess the capacity of climate laws and policies in Namibia to adapt to climate change. The assessment was done through the UN-Habitat Urban Law Module of the Law and Climate Change Toolkit…

UN-Habitat, the Konrad-Adenauer-Stiftung Regional Programme Energy Security and Climate Change in Sub-Saharan Africa (KAS), and the University of Michigan (United States of America), through the project on Urban Law for Resilient and Low Carbon Urban Development in Malawi, Namibia, and Zimbabwe, were able to assess the capacity of climate laws and policies in Malawi to adapt to climate change.