Townships and challenges - housing in South Africa
14/04/08
Eleanor Bouw-Spies, Executive Mayor of the Knysna Municipality, shared her experiences of working in housing development in South's African's town of Knysna at this year's CIH South East annual conference.
Eleanor first showed the audience a video of her town of Knysna, before describing its housing challenges and their responses. She cited the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa which states that 'Everyone has the right to have access to adequate housing'.
Knysna's policy context is provided by the Western Cape Provincial Growth and Development Strategy - a planning tool and framework - and the National and Western Cape Sustainable Human Settlements Strategy, both of which are breaking new ground.
There is also Vision 2020, an extensive planning document setting out seven strategic objectives. 'And our State of the Environment report and our local framework also guide us - we use them as planning documents.'
Knysna is a town with a lot of tourism. 'It's a prime economic driver and contributes over 40% to the local economy.'
Eleanor described how lower income communities, with current housing need, are historically confined to a limited geographical area. 'And there is quite a disparity in terms of our distribution of wealth - it's a challenge that we have.'
She went on to talk about Knysna's growth in housing demand. 'We had a baseline population of 70,000 in 2006, with an estimated 4% pa rate of growth until 2012. 87% of the population is earning less than R120,000 (approx £9,000).'
'We don't have limited land, but we do have a shortage of provincial funding. As a local authority we must pitch in over and above the provincial funding we receive. We are not really a housing provider - we are seen as an agent and we identify budgets. In fact we are one of the few local authorities that actually tops up funds. But there's always an expectation that we must provide houses.'
Most of Knysna's housing backlog falls within the lower income range. There are 4,500 people, mostly migrants, living in its informal settlements. Most of their houses are unplanned, on unsuitable land. Space is cramped and the services are poor.
Eleanor described the pressure to supply 'homes for all'. 'People want one house with a big yard and development has often focused on one-storey homes - but we have to look at going higher if we want to meet the backlogs that we have. And we need to increase our density in urban areas.'
'We also need to look at facilitating home loans. We are looking at projects that are realistic and affordable. We are struggling with land - our specific challenges are land affordability, given the target market, and sufficient infrastructure.'
Knysna is a popular town - with more people wanting to buy property there, prices are being pushed up. 'We are trying to meet the challenges with a variety of housing models. And we have started co-operating with the four big banks - we are making municipal land available and making it affordable by getting the banks involved. And we've been embarking in partnerships with other stakeholders. We cannot do it alone.'
'We have built a lot of houses - in fact we have built five million houses since 1999. But we haven't been building communities.'
Read other session reviews from the 2008 CIH South East conference