The International Federation for Housing and Planning (IFHP) is developing a ‘tool-box’ to help cities secure affordable housing for its citizens.

Every human has the right to decent housing. Yet, almost two billion people across the world risk not having access to decent housing in the near future. The challenges that this bring will be felt the hardest by city governments as rapid urbanisation is expected to result in a world where two thirds of all people on earth will be an urban dweller by mid-century. With the project Affordable Housing for All supported by Realdania, IFHP has decided to dedicate its efforts to the cause of affordable housing. A project to make cities better for people.

In 2020, IFHP will create a new and practical policy ‘tool-box’ helping cities to navigate the everchanging landscape of housing politics and secure affordable housing for all its citizens. It will help make the strategic urban planning efforts of local governments simpler and have more predictable outcomes. This is going to be achieved by identifying available policy measure and estimate the effects they might have on housing affordability.

The problem of creating affordable housing is universal. On every continent cities are faced with the same challenges, namely how to meet the tremendous growth in demand for decent housing? How to plan for dramatic demographic changes? How do housing policies intersect with other societal issues such as education, infrastructure, sustainable development and climate action?

With the ultimate goal of scaling the project to the international level, the tool-box is initially going to be developed out of the Danish context as a proxy. The project will suggest relevant and practical policy instruments addressing key challenges such as the re-development of existing housing stock, development of new housing areas, creation of new partnerships between local and national governments with commercial stakeholders, re-design of administrative processes and the coordination of housing and infrastructure.

The project will assess the effect on affordability for every identified policy instrument by applying existing economic models. In acknowledging that different measures are needed in different places the aim is for the tool-box to be adaptable and dynamic. Thus, the assessment of policy instruments will consider two different scenarios–a demographic growth scenario and a scenario for cities facing a decline in the population.

The project is made possible by a grant from Realdania. Because of this a number of Danish municipalities with varying conditions and challenges are included in the collaboration. In addition to this, an advisory group of municipalities and various interest-groups have been assembled with which IFHP will regularly confer. This will assure the practical usefulness and legitimacy of the tool-box.

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