Human Settlements

Major achievements in 2003

The Committee on Human Settlements at its annual session in September 2003 held an in-depth discussion on reforms and social equity in human settlements. The discussion showed that the rise in urban poverty was one of the most serious concerns in the region. While poverty, social exclusion and inequality are much more pronounced in the countries in transition, they are also an integral part of the social landscape of large metropolitan areas in Western Europe and North America. The high rate of poverty and inequality in urban areas leads to the exclusion of certain population groups from adequate health care, education and housing. Cumulative disadvantages, often defined along the lines of gender, age and ethnicity, create widening social disparities between different social groups with low-income, single-parent or women-led households being worst off. It was decided that the Committee would contribute to raising awareness on the need to integrate human settlements reforms with policies promoting social stability and social equity by providing substantive input to the regional follow-up meeting to the World Summit on Sustainable Development in January 2004.

Country profiles on the housing sector for Armenia and the Russian Federation were prepared. Conceptual changes have been implemented within the country profile programme, in particular through a shift to a more problem-oriented approach. The follow-up of the implementation of past country profiles is being stressed. In this context, a round table on the follow-up of the country profile on Romania has been held. A land administration review on the Russian Federation has been carried out. The results of the review fed into the preparation of the country profile on the Russian Federation.

Three workshops have been held dealing with concerns related to land registration and land markets: one on mass valuation systems of land for taxation, one on customers-cooperation services and one on spatial information management for sustainable real estate markets. A workshop on social housing was organized in cooperation with CECODHAS, an NGO active in the area of social housing. The workshop aimed at identifying aspects of particular concern on which member countries would like to concentrate future work, in particular guidelines on social housing.

Preparations of the guidelines on housing finance have been largely finalized. The work on the implementation of the Guidelines on Condominiums is ongoing. In this context, a workshop to discuss their implementation in Eastern Europe will be held in Moscow.

Major challenges for 2004

The work during this period will concentrate on the country profile programme as well as the land administration reviews. A number of countries have expressed an interest in having a country profile carried out. In addition, it is foreseen that a regional housing profile for South-East Europe will be prepared in cooperation with other international organizations active in the region. A land administration review will be carried out for Lithuania. The UNECE Land Administration Guidelines will be updated in order to reflect the new challenges that the countries in transition are facing after having implemented a considerable number of transition policies, such as land transfer to the local level and privatization. A task force will be set up for the preparation of guidelines on local planning. Two workshops on land administration will be held: one in Lithuania on information technology in land administration and the other in Armenia. Preparations of the guidelines on social housing will continue to give particular emphasis to the governance and financing of social housing. A second workshop on social housing will be held at the end of the year to present the contents of the guidelines. ISOCARP, an international NGO of urban planners, and the Committee will jointly organize the indepth discussion for the next Committee's session.

The resource constraints in the secretariat are felt in particular in implementing the programme on in-depth country reviews of human settlements and land administration, which require much preparatory, coordination and finalization work by the secretariat. These programmes are, however, much appreciated by countries in transition. Consequently, there is often a long delay between the request by a specific country for a review and the time that the secretariat can prepare one. Also, the follow-up to reviews is limited by resource constraints.