Developping low-income housing in Kigali’s unplanned settlements

At the end of August, we were in Kigali for the first time to talk about developing and maintaining low-income housing in Kigali’s unplanned settlements, in the framework of a study financed by the French Development Agency.

This study takes place in the framework of an urban upgrading project targetting two of Kigali’s unplanned settlements, Kagugu & Rwezamenyo, for which the Rwandan government has requested AFD's support. Since urban upgrading often goes along with gentrification, the Rwandan authorities are wondering what solutions to implement in order to avoid the eviction of the most precarious households and to maintain a low-income housing offer in the neighbourhoods. The mission therefore aims to inform the Rwandan government and the city of Kigali on the solutions that could be implemented to this effect. It should also enable the formulation of recommendations for the scaling up of these solutions to other neighbourhoods of the city or even of the country, in line with the national urban upgrading strategy, as well as with the national housing policy.

Led in partnership with GRET, the mission includes

• Carrying out a targeted diagnosis of the housing market in Kigali's unplanned settlements, with a focus on the two neighbourhoods targeted by the project, and identifying the first possible solutions,
• Conducting two participatory workshops with a committee of experts/actors involved in the production of affordable housing in Kigali, in order to enrich the diagnosis, discuss possible solutions and evaluate the feasibility of scaling up,
• Conducting a community consultation process to assess the feasibility of the identified solutions with the targeted actors, and to prototype the solutions on the architectural, operational and financial levels.

This first mission allowed us to refine our diagnosis through several site visits/interviews, to define the specifications of the solutions to be developed and to discuss our first lines of action with the members of the committee through a first participatory workshop.

It raised many questions but also enabled us to lay solid foundations with the local stakeholders, a dynamic which will enable us to refine things later.