KRIHS holds meetings with Mexico’s SEDATU and CONAVI

Date: July 11, 2016
Venue: SEDATU headquarters and CONAVI headquarters
About: Sharing Korea’s development experience regarding urban and housing issues facing Mexico, and discussing future cooperation

The Global Development Partnership Center of the Korea Research Institute for Human Settlements (KRIHS) held business meetings with the National Housing Commission (CONAVI) and the Secretary of Agrarian, Urban and Territorial Development (SEDATU) in the Mexico City, Mexico on July 11. The CONAVI and SEDATU, which had participated in the 2015 and 2016 KRIHS-IDB Urban Development Academy (KIUDA) hosted by the KRIHS, sought to have discussions for sustainable, specific cooperation.

In a meeting with the CONAVI, the KRIHS listened to the outcome and problems of Mexico’s housing policy and public rental housing policy, and shared Korea’s development experience. To address the housing problem of those in the low-income bracket, Mexico has mostly relied on subsidies, but this has brought about another social issue, as these subsidies were mostly used to develop the outskirts area of cities. Accordingly, the CONAVI said it hoped the public rental housing would be a new alternative for the low-income people, asking for the counsel from the KRIHS.

The issues covered during a meeting with the SEDATU included rising infrastructure development costs from reckless urban sprawl in Mexico, housing shortage, both quantitatively and qualitatively, urban poverty and vacant housing. The SEDATU introduced newly launched urban management methods, as well as the General Law of Human Settlements, Territorial Ordering and Urban Planning designed to deal with these problems. The KRIHS and SEDATU agreed to further solidify cooperation in a bid to resolve urban issues in Mexico.

Furthermore, on July 12-13, a meeting was held in the Mexico City to report on the initiation of the “research on Latin America public rental housing policy proposals,” which was placed by the Inter-Development Bank (IDB) and is being carried out by the KRIHS. During the meeting, Miseon Park, an associate research fellow at the KRIHS, delivered a presentation on the public rental housing policy in Korea. Officials from seven Latin American countries took part in the meeting to share each country’s housing policies and pending issues.

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