Youth from four Asia-Pacific countries to implement projects to address housing issues, as well as land tenure, slums, disaster resilience.

MANILA (May 25, 2017) – Youth influencers from Bangladesh, Indonesia, Korea and Nepal took centerstage in the 2017 Habitat Young Leaders Build advocacy grants.

The seven grant winners will be supported with a minimal seed fund to implement youth-led advocacy projects. They aim to resolve housing issues by influencing decision makers in changing community practices or systems with regard to security of land tenure, gender and property rights, slum upgrading and disaster resilience.

The winners are:

• Aakar Nepal, Nepal – “My Habitat My World” leverages on creative activities with young people and children to raise awareness and gain public support for enabling slum dwellers to gain access to decent housing.
• Augustinus Wisnu Wardana and Amalia Ji Darmastuti, Sebelas Maret University, Indonesia – “Friendly Space for Children in Slums” aims to gather inputs from community members, particularly children, and raise awareness on how to improve living conditions. It also highlights the importance of providing safe public spaces for children in the slum settlement along the Kali Pepe riverbank in Kota Surakarta, Indonesia.
• CriticaLink, Bangladesh – “Habitat Online Information Hub” aims to centralize and organize different housing policies for easy access on one single website.
• Habitat for Humanity Korea’s Keimyung University Chapter, Korea – “Better, Stronger Homes for Disasters” looks at organizing workshops and seminars to disseminate information on the impact of natural disasters and gather inputs for improving disaster mitigation plans and construction practices for residential buildings.
• Parkmandu-Pocket Parks for Kathmandu, Nepal – “Pocket Park for Bagmati River Slums” is about engaging slum dwellers to help them understand their right to safe public spaces. It aims to promote a healthy lifestyle, particularly for young people, and to encourage them to lobby for and build a park.
• Rural Women Development Centre, Nepal – ”Helping Slum Dwellers Understand and Secure Their Rights” looks to raising a local community’s awareness of the right to decent shelter and the realization of the right. Approaches include lobbying local government bodies to reduce the threat of eviction and ensure that slum dwellers have access to government facilities.
• Sonal Gupta, Nepal – “The Post-Earthquake Housing Design” calls for an incremental housing design concept to help low-income rural families rebuild their homes following the earthquakes.

This is the second year that Habitat called for proposals and supported youth-led advocacy projects. The review and selection process involved Habitat representatives from across the region.