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An investigation of the Social housing and housing in

Sub -Saharan Africa (The case study- Zanzibar)

Social Sustainable Urbanization

Prof: Maria Chiara Pastore Student: Mina Ghorbanbakhsh Assistant: Corinna delbianco

Polytechnic university of Milan

Master degree of Sustainable Architecture and Landscape design (Piacenza campus)

Course: Urban Design for Development (Milano Leonardo campus) July 2015

           

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An investigation of the Social housing and housing in Sub -Saharan Africa (The case study- Zanzibar) Social Sustainable Urbanization Prof: Maria Chiara Pastore Student: Mina Ghorbanbakhsh Assistant: Corinna delbianco Introduction Urbanization, urbanizing world, a world of cities are the most principal facts, coping with global future, specifically with the future of the developing countries, which includes Sub- Saharan Africa. (Ameyibor 2003)

In Sub- Saharan Africa people are usually suffering a lot in urban areas because of the growth of population and they have all experienced a mass rural to urban migration. It is like a dilemma that developing countries and their metropolitan areas are facing with, which their urban dwellers have developed their infrastructure. (Ameyibor 2003) (Bridwell 2004)Which this growing, informal growing of settlements, has a lot of effects on different aspects. Such as, the matter of lack of adequate houses and the matter of providing enough shelters, even for low-income people, also lack of having infrastructure, adequate structural safety and societal friction. (Bridwell 2004)

The question which comes out is that, How to provide the affordable housing, not only for the Middle level of the society but also, for the low-income people? This research is going to discuss about the Affordable housing provisions or social housing, which is the main issue in these centuries in Sub-Saharan Africa and also recognizing the materials of these architectures. Moreover, to figure out, If, the architectures are in related to the local climate and materials or not.

  Urban growth problem in Sub- Saharan Africa According to the growth of the population (informal growth) in Sub-Saharan Africa (after most African countries obtained their independence), which is in next 40 years, is going to be triple than right now a lot of figures are alarming. (BBC NEWS 2010)

Cities are growing in 3 verified distinct: in number, in area and in the population (Sub Saharan Africa: 4-7 percent per year (Kombe ET al.2000: 2). (Ameyibor 2003). As it mentioned before, the matter of lack of adequate houses and providing enough shelters and another problem of these settlements is the absence of the infrastructure services. As an illustration, only 50 percent of the urban population in Africa has access to water supply.

But among all the problems, there is a big problem that all the African countries have, that they have enormous gap between growth of population and

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economic growth. Which means economic development doesn’t match the population development. Today, the percentage of urban residents living below the poverty line in Sub- Saharan Africa is more than 40 percent (UNCHS 2001: 18) (Wolfgang 2001). And also according to the division that the world bond provides of the middle class, 60 percent of it falls in the lowest income bracket.

Under this pressure of urbanization the cities are confronted with several issues  as it mentioned above. The population has to be provided with land, housing, jobs and services. But the city administrations are not able to cope with the demand, because they lack resources in manpower and finances.

In result, The effect of all this factors, the informal settlements are growing sharply, cause they have to follow some rules, regulations and existing planning which are inappropriate to reply to the people’s need and demand. (Fekade, 2000:1) (Ameyibor 2003).

Social housing problem in Sub- Saharan Africa The majority of people are underneath of poverty line. According to the urban foundation’s own calculation of adequate living levels, 34% of the metropolitan black population earn incomes below the minimum living level of R700 per month (approximately 200 pounds). Which makes affordability as another big problem. The housing that is being built is not affordable. On this reason 1.3 billion people live in inadequate shelter as described. (Napier 1993)

The Habitat Agenda from UNCHS, the Agenda 21 (as an outcome of the United Nations Conference on environment and development in Rio de Janeiro 1992) and the Sustainable Cities Program (SCP) (a joint program of United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) and UN-Habitat). The two main issues of the Habitat Agenda are “adequate shelter for all” and “sustainable human settlements development in an urbanizing world” (UNCHS 1996: 1) (Ameyibor 2003). ���

The case study

The location of Zanzibar

Zanzibar is located in the Indian Ocean 37 km off the east coast of Africa. Politically it belongs to the United Republic of Tanzania. The archipelago of Zanzibar consists of two major islands, which are called Unguja and Pemba. Unguja, which is often referred to as Zanzibar, is the larger island with 1658 sq. km (Website Zanzinet Forum)

The History of the city of Zanzibar First permanent settlements on Unguja Island were, established by Shirazis in the 7th century AD, a Persian people that transferred the Islamic religion to the

           

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island. Together with Arab merchants they developed a stable trading base for the Indian Ocean.

In the 16th and 17th century Portuguese colonists ruled Zanzibar, but their influence on the development was marginal. The power of the Portuguese declined in the 18th century and the Omani Arabs, who originally came as merchants, took over (Awadh et al. 1998: 6). In the middle of the 19th century the British East India Company began to rule the Indian Ocean trade and Zanzibar was a British protectorate between 1890 and the independence of 1963. After the independence a sultan was empowered but the legitimacy of the sultanate was questioned until the revolution in 1964. Since then Zanzibar belongs politically to the United Republic of Tanzania, which is a union of Tanganyika (Tanzania mainland) and Zanzibar. (Ameyibor 2003)

Zanzibar was the capital of an island empire of the same name. It has grown rapidly (the city) among the smaller metropolises of Africa and also bound by a shared revolutionary history. Zanzibar town consists of two main parts: Stone town and Ng’ambo.

Stone town, adjacent to the ocean in the western part of the island, used to be separated from Ng’ambo by a creek, which is now drained.

The Omani’s rule influenced this town in the 19th century. This fact is visible in stone town, which is the oldest part of the city.

Stone town was predominately inhabited by Omanis, Arabs and Indians, Ng’ambo used to be the quarter of the African people. Ng’ambo is approximately seventeen times as big as Stone Town (16 hectares) and inhabits the majority of the population of Zanzibar Town (The Aga Khan Trust for Culture 1996: 65). (Ameyibor 2003)

 Colonization in Zanzibar According to the effects of transnational efforts to conserve a "historic" section of Zanzibar city, residents frequently invoked the past as a critique of the present, lamenting the current state of urban conditions. "If you had seen the city as it existed in the past "a young Zanzibari of Comorian descent assured me, "tears would fall from your eyes now"(interview with Amir Issa, November23, 1993).'

Zanzibar city has often been described as a classic colonial dual order. The older section, now named MjiM kongwe (but known as Stone Town in English), took shape on a triangular peninsula connected to the main island by a small neck of land. The colonial social and spatial order was decisively over turned by the revolution of January1964, which occupied and reworked the old city under the sign of African and socialism. In rural areas and in Ng'ambo, considerable resources were diverted to construct modernist blocks of public

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housing under East German sponsorship in the late 1960s and 1970s.

With the push to create new blocks of flats, older buildings had received little maintenance; after 20 years, the urban core was in an advancing state of decay (see Figure 1). And Stone Town was no longer simply a space for sociability or shelter for citizens.

Figure  1  Collapsed  House,  Kiponda,  Zanzibar

 

In the early 1980s, a Chinese planning team singled out "Stone Town "as a "famous historic city" unique along the East African coast.

In 1983, a UN Habitat team issued the first conservation master plan for the city (LaNier et al. 1983). (Bissell, Engaging Colonial Nostalgia n.d.)

Beyond the reach of most Zanzibaris, many were forced to relocate outside the city. Public buildings were privatized and converted into tourist facilities. Invest or sand wealthy exiles bought out poorer residents and transformed their dwellings into hotels or luxury homes. Urban development in this context has resulted in highly contained niches of wealth and comfort, pockets of privilege that have been walled off from the effects of public sector decline.

Urban growth problem in Zanzibar

In the beginning of the 1990s the population of Zanzibar Town was below 200,000, in 1998 it was 230,000 and projections show that Zanzibar Town will double its population by the year 2018 (The Aga Khan Trust for Culture 1996: 77 and Awadh et al. 1998: 10). (Ameyibor 2003)

There are a lot of elements that creates an unpredicted urban growth and development of Zanzibar. The sharp rise in urban growth rate around 4.5 percent per annum (Government of Tanzania 2002), The fact that Zanzibar Island has the highest population density in Africa: 350 inhabitants ���per square kilometer (ZSP 1998), The limited availability of resources and fertile land due to the small size of the island, ���The limited capacity of the state to control urban growth and to provide planned building ���land and The high percentage of the town area covered by informal settlements. (Wolfgang 2001)

           

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Sustainable Architecture and Houses in Zanzibar The traditional Architecture of Africa has always been sustainable. The idea of constructing buildings to adapt to the environment was one of the goals of modern architecture during the colonial times. Because of the climate, which exist in Zanzibar, hot, humid or sometimes dry climates. The colonialists’ building agendas included plans to regulate the inside climate of their buildings through both design and natural means, such as passive daylight and cross ventilation. Such buildings achieved their objectives through a variety of means: orientation, long eaves, pitched roofs with ventilation openings, shading, elevating the buildings so as to allow wind to circulate below them, and also by climatically well-adapted material choices and construction methods (Folkers 2010).

The fact about the materials of the majority of dwellers (Rural Population which they live in) in Zanzibar, are made of pressed mud. And just 3% of the population lives in dwellings of concrete or stone and only Twenty-three percent use mud brick. It shows that, the use of modern housing material has increased in all areas since the last Housing Budget Survey in 1991 (Appendix A, Chart 2). (Bridwell 2004).

Usually in Zanzibar, typical Houses are designed in this way. The normal detail at the houses, are the stone benches either outside the house or seen in the first hallway when looking in from the main entrance door. These benches, or sitting arrangements, are called ‘Baraza’ in Kiswahili and a symbol for the rich social life in the Swahili culture. The outside Baraza benches are often found in the merchant part of Stone Town were business could both discussed and displayed openly. In the Arab houses the Baraza benches are found inside. In the more prominent Arab houses there was even a second ‘Zanzibar door’ in the hallway leading to a room where guests could be invited for more private discussions. Black and white marble tiles found on the stairs and entrance to a house is yet another sign of wealth and importance of its owner. (www.Zanzibarstonetown.org n.d.) As an example, the house of wonders which was a palace, built in 1883 for Barghash bin Said, second Sultan of Zanzibar, It was intended as a ceremonial palace and official reception hall, celebrating modernity, and it was named "House of Wonders" because it was the first building in Zanzibar to have electricity, and also the first building of East Africa to have an elevator.

The design of the palace was with a British marine engineer and indeed its form introduced new architectural elements into the Zanzibar repertoire, including the wide external verandas supported by cast iron columns, which allowed for uniquely high ceilings. The construction materials consisted of an original combination of coral rag, concrete slabs, mangrove shoots or boriti, and steel beams.

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Sustainability and affordability of social housing or housing Economic growth and poverty reduction

For having a sustainability and affordability in housing and social housing, some aspects are becoming important. Such as, having a good economical growth, we will face the reduction of the poverty in a society. And by having a balance, the dream of solving the problems for labor levels of the society will be done. And this is the solution for having sustainability in terms of economic. Although Africa has been frequently described as featuring disconnect between urbanization and economic growth but in reality most of the economic growth that has been taken place in the past decade derives from mainly urban based sectors. (kessides 2005) The growth of cities favors poverty reduction in several ways. By creating a wider and deeper labor market and facilitating the provision of services. Urban areas experience both concentrated demand, and offer the widest options of supply, for both jobs and services. Which means by creating more opportunities, for finding jobs and proper work with a income that won’t consider the people as a workers, They would have more options and deeper and better facilities. (kessides 2005)

Beside, all the aspects which mentioned above, about the reducing poverty and economic growth, There is another element which UN Habitat argues about it that decentralization will increase economic efficiency and political accountability, and hence help reduce urban poverty (Devas et al., 2004, pp. 23–31; UN-Habitat, 2005). (goebel 2007) Because, by the mid-1990s the ANC recognized that centralized planning for housing made it difficult for local governments to address local needs effectively (Huchzermeyer, 2001, p. 303). (goebel 2007)

Affordability and accessibility to the housing

The main priorities of sustainable human settlements comprises the improvement of living conditions and opportunities for all inhabitants and reducing or minimizing the risk of exposure to disease and poverty in a way that does not impact negatively on the natural environment. Developers must ensure that dwellings must be affordable and accessible for the end user beneficiaries as well for local authorities who will be responsible for the maintenance and upkeep of related infrastructure services on the dwellings. Affordability refers to both the initial development capital costs as well as the general maintenance costs. (khaki 2009) A solution for a social housing and housing problems and having sustainability Housing is a challenge to all urban and rural settlements in terms of both quality and quantity. Alternative low cost building materials and building technology have inadequately been addressed in terms of research and construction. ((MP) 2012)

           

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However, still in rural areas people are facing the poor quality of the housing and in towns, they are suffering from shortage and poor hygiene, especially in the housing which they were arbitrary. As an illustration, in Tanzania about 2,000,000 housing units per year are arbitrary (unplanned settlements).

But in contrary, Tanzania is doing a number of programs to increase and improve housing condition in the country. One of these recent programs include formalization of properties in unplanned settlements (a program known in Kiswahili as MKURABITA), The world Bank is implementing Community Infrastructure Upgrading in parts of the major cities, and is transforming the National Housing Corporation to deliver as master developer initiative. ((MP) 2012) Some programs aim to provide subsidized rental accommodation to low-income households, generally in multi-unit buildings in central urban areas. While there were municipal council flats in the apartheid era, social housing options have not until recently figured strongly in the national low-cost housing program. (goebel 2007)

There are some specific programs toward having sustainable city in Zanzibar. One of these programs, started on 1998. They had five working steps, which at the end, they have defined some objectives. Which were as follows: -“To develop a participatory environmental planning and management model (EPM) and to integrate it into the governmental management functions; ��� - To improve the urban environment, health and service provision in specific areas in Zanzibar Municipality, and ��� - To improve the capacity of ZMC, ��� And regularly apply environmental planning and management in the council” (Muhajir et al. 2000: 1). The result was a participatory approach and bringing different stakeholders together in the Working Group Process, it was acting as a mediator between government, civil society and private institutions. (Ameyibor 2003) The need to build affordable housing and other infrastructure is paramount in Zanzibar. While the elite has the means to live adequately, the low-income population suffers the most. The high cost of construction and the lack of financing have left large pockets of metropolitan areas inhabited largely by dense and often impenetrable slums built of wood, sheet metal and card- board. Building affordable housing with adequate structural safety is very important in the developing world. (Bridwell 2004) The other programs are Sustainable Cities Program and the Safer Cities. Despite of these programs, there is also unconscious house design to the impacts of climate change. Emphasis is to be put on building research technology especially on the use of low cost building materials, equity and housing conditions and infrastructure. ((MP) 2012)

The use of indigenous material namely soil compared to the use of cement blocks provides substantial savings. Soil can be also found on the building site,

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eliminating unnecessary transportation costs that come, with ready-made materials. Such as, cement block and fried brick. (Bridwell 2004)

Conclusion

The first step toward the sustainability, is considering all the levels of the society, and definitely for reaching the highest quality of life, Not only in Zanzibar but also in sub-Saharan African countries, the utilization of the indigenous materials and resources are important and vital.

In one hand, using the local materials is a way to reach the sustainability. As Karim Pirnia (Iranian Architect, 1920-1997) said: The sustainability in housing and cities are coming, when people and architects are using the materials and facilities that they have in their own city. He created five facts toward the Architecture. And one of these elements was, utilizing the local materials. Which is useable for new construction and also for renovation, because it is natural and it is suitable for that specific area. As in the past, they did in Zanzibar. If this process will continue, all the dwellings will be cheaper.

In another hand, it is another approach to the economic sustainability. In a way that using the local materials makes it cheaper and however using the local skills.

All in all, these aspects, increases the affordability of the housing for labor level (workers) and the middle class.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

           

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References

MP, Dr, Terezya L. Huvisa. National report for the United Nations conference on sustainable development, Rio+20, Vice president office, 2012, Dares Salaam. https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/content/documents/980tanzania.pdf

Ameyibor, Steve Basteck, Timo Bierbaum, Claudia frommeld, Nadine Giaourakis, Nike Hackenbroch, Kirsten Kirchberg, Axel Kutsch. Informal settlements development in Zanzibar, Dortmund University, 2003, Dortmund, Germany. http://www.raumplanung.tu dortmund.de/ips/cms/Medienpool/documents/F03_Informal_Settlements_Development_on_Zanzibar.pdf

BBC News, Africa section. Africa’s cities to triple in size, 2010. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-11823146

Bissell, William Cunningham. Engaging colonial nostalgia, Willey on behalf of the American Anthropological Association, May 2005.    http://www.culanth.org/articles/460-engaging-colonial-nostalgia

Bridwell, Rumit Mehta and Larry. Innovative construction technology for affordable mass housing in Tanzania, East Africa, New York, Pace University, 2004. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/0144619042000287769#abstract

Folkers, Antoni. Modern Architecture in Africa, Ohio, USA, 2010. http://www.amazon.com/Modern-Architecture-Africa-Antoni-Folkers/dp/9085069610

Napier, Mark. Housing Problem in South Africa, Ideological Perspectives, 1993. http://research.ncl.ac.uk/forum/v2i1/Housing%20Problem%20in%20South%20Africa.pdf

Scholz, Wolfgang. Challenges of informal urbanization, University of Dortmund, Faculty of spatial planning, 2001. http://www.amazon.de/Challenges-­‐Informal-­‐Urbanisation-­‐Zanzibar-­‐Tanzania/dp/3934525504 http://www.jstor.org/stable/3651534?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents

Goebel, Allison. Sustainable urban development? Low-cost housing challenges in South Africa, Habitat International, Canada, 2007. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0197397507000185

https://stonetownheritagesociety.wordpress.com/stone-town/stone-town-architecture/

Kessides, Christine. The urban transition in Sub-Saharan Africa implications for economic growth and poverty reduction, Africa, The World Bank, 2005. http://www.worldbank.org/afr/wps/wp97.pdf

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Khaki, Imran. Housing in South Africa, The challenge to provide Sustainable, Integrated, Affordable housing, 2009. http://scholar.sun.ac.za/handle/10019.1/919

www.Zanzibarstonetown.org