Projects

Active Projects

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UN-Habitat in Pakistan

UN-Habitat’s engagement in Pakistan began on a small scale in the 1990’s addressing issues of secure tenure and other related problems. It further revived its operations after the 2005 earthquake. During the period 2006-2010 through the rural housing reconstruction programme, 3.5 million were successfully moved to safer and better homes; 14,000 families were moved to safer places from hazardous land and over 55,00 houses were constructed by the women-headed households.

The floods of 2010 affected more than 18 million people and caused an estimated $10 billion in damages. They were followed by heavy monsoon rains in September 2011, which affected some 9.7 million people in Sind hand Balochistan. Natural disasters have disproportionately affected the excluded and the vulnerable.

UN-Habitat Pakistan has extensive experiences, expertise and human resources in the fields of Housing, Basic Services, Community Infrastructure, Urban Development, Disaster Risk Management and Geographical Information Management. During its biggest project, Pakistan Settlements Flood Recovery Project, UN-Habitat maintained a strength of over 700 national and international staff with country office in Islamabad and provincial offices in Lahore, Karachi, Quetta and Mardan. In addition to these locations, UN-Habitat operated out of 12 field offices throughout the provinces of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Baluchistan, Sindh and Punjab.

Today, UN-Habitat’s engagement in Pakistan is in the areas of housing, community infrastructure, basic services, urban development, disaster risk management/early recovery land and property, and Geographic Information Management (GIS). The implementation approach is primarily “community-led” development, people’s process approach in which affected populations takes charge of their recovery, rehabilitation and development.

From 2005 to 2013, UN-Habitat has a total portfolio of more than $100 million for it developments and humanitarian work.

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Completed Projects

UN-Habitat Pakistan’s Portfolio

Project Background

Pakistan is affected with excess of natural and human induced hazards. Most of the school buildings and educational institutions do not comply with the hazards due to lack of resistance designs. Khyber Pakhtunkhwa is one of the most highly affected province of Pakistan that has been impacted by every major disaster, and existing educational infrastructure in KP is facing wear and tear of the years’ neglect which is further aggravated by conflicts, natural disasters. During a disaster, there are two major causes which disrupt the education system of the area:

  1. The school infrastructure is destroyed as a result of the calamity leading to schools becoming non-functional until rehabilitation efforts are undertaken
  2. The functional school buildings become temporary relief shelters for the people of the area.

In the education sector, national and provincial bodies have been diligently working for the inclusion of Disaster Preparedness/Disaster Risk Reduction (DP/DRR) at all levels.

For the year 2017, ECHO has allocated 1 million for Disaster Preparedness/Disaster Risk Reduction (DP/DRR) and therefore UN-Habitat has picked the implementation of Pillar 1 – Safe Learning Facilities, focusing on infrastructural and non-infrastructural changes regarding retrofitting, repairing, and strengthening of existing school buildings to meet the international standards of disaster resilience.

Project Rational

Pakistan, especially KPK, has been increasingly hit by natural and human-induced disasters in the past that have disrupted KP’s education system as many school buildings were fully or partially destroyed or used as temporary shelters during disasters. Hence, DP/DRR policy actions were introduced at federal level, which encouraged disaster resilient construction for new schools. Following the 18th Amendment, KP government also promoted disaster resilience for not just new schools, but also the existing schools. The secondary data analysis conducted, however, identified that policy actions/recommendations are not reflected in the ADB/ADP and none of the existing school buildings are being retrofitted. As a result, this project has been designed to make the schools of KP safe learning facilities as per the CSS framework and PSSF. UN-Habitat will focus on Pillar 1 to bridge the gap between policies and implementation.

Through this project, technical vulnerability assessments will be carried out for 36 (6 schools of each 6 typologies) schools in Peshawar and Swat, involving relevant authorities (MoE, C&W, PDMA, DDMA, and others) followed by development of a prioritization schema of schools to be retrofitted-endorsed by these authorities. 12 schools will be selected for retrofitting (at least 1 class room in each school) to serve as models which can be replicated and the lessons learnt during the retrofitting process will be documented to feed into the retrofitting, repair, and strengthening guidelines that will be developed as a manual for the relevant authorities to use. In order for the government to finance and scale-up this project, extensive advocacy will be undertaken to influence the ADP/ADB 2018-2019, such that fresh funds are earmarked for retrofitting of existing schools to make school buildings of Peshawar and Swat safe learning facilities for learners and workers by ensuring they are resilient to both natural and human-induced disasters.

Implementation Strategy

UNHABITAT as the lead applicant has the responsibility to the donor(s). UNHABITAT and HOPE’87 are jointly responsible for the overall management and implementation of the project on ground. This includes delivery of project results quality financial, narrative reports and ensuring high standards of transparency and accountability are employed by all stakeholders throughout the project.

Project Goal

To reduce vulnerability and promote resilience of rural and urban populations living in areas most affected by natural and human induced disasters in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, by increasing the preparedness and response capacities of local communities and authorities to potential and frequent threats

Outcomes & Output

Ensuring that the learners and education workers are protected from physical hazards in schools through structural and non-structural measures, therefore contributing to pillar one of SBDRM model in KP, strengthening school Disaster Management

Coordination Mechanism

UN-Habitat works closely with both national and local authorities in all its projects.

There are several other platforms where UN supports the Government of Pakistan for betterment of the Pakistani people. Under the same fora UN-Habitat and HOPE87 will be sharing the project progress, successes and challenges faced by the project teams through regular reporting, meetings and advocacy. Further, through the establishment of a Project Steering Committee at Islamabad level, NDMA and PDMA KP will be kept in the loop on regular basis. All project activities from start and completion will be coordinated with KP Government.