Housing as a Human Right Regional Insights and Strategies for the Arab World

This Urban Library session will launch the regional report “Regional Housing Sector Analysis and Strategic Directions in Arab States” and convene a focused, solution-oriented dialogue on what it will take to advance adequate housing as a human right and accelerate SDG 11 in the Arab region. At a time of economic volatility, conflict and displacement, climate pressures, and widening inequality, housing has re-emerged as a strategic lever for social stability and resilient development—yet many countries continue to face persistent gaps in affordability, adequacy, tenure security, and access to basic services, alongside growing informality and exclusion. The report responds to this urgency by providing updated regional and country housing-sector briefs for ten countries (Egypt, Jordan, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Syria, Morocco, Tunisia, Palestine, and Yemen), identifying common structural constraints and policy bottlenecks, and highlighting scalable practices that can be adapted across different contexts. Developed through the global partnership between Habitat for Humanity and UN-Habitat, and strengthened through regional collaboration with the League of Arab States, the report proposes strategic directions that link housing delivery, planning, tenure and upgrading, rental and finance reforms, and multilevel governance that treats housing as critical social infrastructure. The session will combine a concise presentation of headline findings with a facilitated discussion bringing together Housing Ministry delegates from Arab countries, regional partners (including LAS), and practitioners to debate priorities, trade-offs, and implementable solutions—turning evidence into actionable policies and financing pathways that expand adequate, safe, inclusive, and affordable housing at scale. Objectives · Present key evidence and comparative insights on housing conditions, gaps, and trends across the ten focus countries and the region. · Assess common challenges shaping adequate housing outcomes, including affordability pressures, informality, tenure insecurity, and service deficits. · Highlight promising, scalable policy and programme approaches (e.g., social/affordable housing, upgrading and regularization, tenure measures, integrated planning). · Discuss practical financing and delivery pathways to reach low-income and underserved groups, including options to diversify housing finance and treat housing as social infrastructure. · Strengthen