Household Expenditure Affordability Thresholds for Housing, Water, Energy and Transport in South Africa Human Settlements is the title of a paper at the Sustainable Urbanization through Research, Innovations and Partnerships Conference, Nelson Mandela University, Port Elizabeth, 6-10 May 2019. The abstract for the paper is provided below.

Human settlements and housing are a part of people’s material living conditions and contribute directly to their life choices. Human settlements that are poorly located, constructed and serviced force households to spend a larger proportion of their income on transport, energy and water. This leaves less for food, education and health, seeking employment, starting a business or saving for pension or a house. In poor families this reduces access to education opportunities, increases susceptibility to ill health and disease and makes it more difficult to escape the cycle of poverty.

Therefore a key sustainability indicator of human settlements and housing must be the proportion of household expenditure on transport, water and energy.

The paper carries out a literature review to understand patterns household income and expenditure. Household expenditure indicators and benchmarks are reviewed to propose benchmarks for sustainable housing and settlements. These are critically reviewed in relation to South African human settlement data to establish their relevance and applicability. Results are discussed to ascertain implications for human settlement and housing policy and recommendations for further research developed.

Please contact me if you would like a copy of the paper.