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ACHR

The Asian Coalition for Housing Rights is a regional network of grassroots community organizations, NGO's and professionals actively involved with urban poor development processes in Asian cities.

 

updates

WHAT'S    NEW    FROM    ACHR

Site Links
ACCALogo

 

 

ACHR Home

ACCA

Young Professionals
Community Architects

e-News

Disaster Recovery

ACHR Activities
Overview

Understanding Asian CIties

External Links

Download Library

In House

 

ACCA by Counrtry

 

 

Some New Links

The discussions held at the Community Architects Meeting in Chiang Mai - June 2010 - are available for download Here.

Community Architects Activities List 2009 -2010

New BLOG of day to day expeiences of ACHR supported Community Architects in Fiji

6 minute video of floods in Ladakh from Andre's friend Thinlay

 

 

 

 

 

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STRATEGIES
THAT WORK

Community Savings
by Diana Mitlin

Savings and Credit
by Celine D'Cruz

Building Tools for Communities
from Face to Face Exchanges

Community Funds

32 page ACHR Newsletter


Thai Urban Poor Networks 
by Somsook Boonyabancha

 

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POETRY  and  DEVELOPMENT
Arif Hasan
  HERE  

 


August 2010   ACHR E-News for July 2010 HERE

ACCA

First Year Statistics here


New set of ACCA upgrading proposals has been accepted here

Our report on Year 1 is availabled in the Download Library HERE

64 CITIES
inYear One
 

     
Somsook appointed to Thailand's National Reform Committee set up after Thailand's political turmoil of the past months.
Somsook Boonyabancha More here
     

YPs
Regional Community Architects Meeting in Chiangmai June 12-16 2010
Organized in Chiang Mai l - June 12-16, 2010 - may very well have been the biggest-yet gathering of COMMUNITY ARCHITECTS IN ASIA.
 
CA Group  

Kirtee Shah, described it this way
 "The energy of the young, their maturity and subject strength, richness of ideas, environment of togetherness and belonging, spirit of sharing, scale (23 countries!), variety and promise - all that was stunning and inspiring to me. It is working! It made me feel young again!

Summary Here and more news on YPs Community Architects.

 

New Publication from ACHR
New Community Architects
Internet Links
Dby People Title

What they do     Who they are    2010

Go here for more information or
Download from our Download Library here.

More links here

     

 

     
UAC
UAC
kc


“After twenty years, I thought things would be getting better here. But I’m sad to see that after all that struggle and all that progress, the housing situation for the poor in Korea is getting much, much worse.”


ACHR returns to South Korea to speak with the Urban Poor and support groups.
Download the ACHR report from its visit from the

Download Library here

 


Arif Hasan

The World Class City Concept and its Repercussions on Urban Planning for Cities in the Asia Pacific Region. From Arif Hasan HERE

UAC
UAC


banbuacvr

A Conversation about Upgrading

An exchange between an international team of professionals who are struggling to find ways to support community-driven upgrading, and a group of community people who are actually doing it. .  ACHR has prepared a 10-page illustrated report which describes the lively exchange: "You thought upgrading a slum was just a matter of paving a few lanes and laying a few drainage pipes ? THINK AGAIN!


Download from the Download Library here


DEVELOPMENT REFORM
February 2006   
Pakistan Karachi
  
International Loans and the Failure of Urban Development

PAKISTAN
Update on OPP- RTI

THAILAND
Ban Mankong Handbook

The Handbook details City Wide Upgrading in
13 Cities in Thailand - Download from Here

BANGLADESH
URBAN POOR Housing By Iftekhar Ahmed May 2007
IN THE DOWNLOAD LIBRARY 2007

VIDEO UPDATE
HERE

video camera


CITIES and DENSITY


There is a growing trend in Asian cities to demolish low income informal settlements and relocate their residents in six to eight story apartment blocks.
There is sufficient evidence to suggest that:
1. low income groups (other than white-collar workers and some of the better-off among the poor) are unhappy with the high-rise solutions for sociological reasons;
2. the units are expensive to maintain and installments for lease or ownership are more often than not unaffordable for the poor residents;
3. residents cannot carry out any informal businesses in the apartments (apart from activities such as giving tuition's or running beauty parlous); and
4. the residents become poorer and some of them destitute. As a result, the majority of them sell their “possession” informally (if they can) at throw away prices and move back as renters to informal settlements in the city centre. The city governments and their planners argue that high-rise apartment living is necessary for it provides higher densities, better social and environmental conditions and enhances the image of the city as a “world class” or “global” city

By Arif Hasan. Asiya Sadiq, Suneela Ahmed                          August 2009

Read more HERE or

DOWNLOAD the paper 157 KB's HERE

 

Technology and the Poor HERE

 

 

     

cvr

PEOPLE & DISASTERS

When DISASTERS happen, how do communities most affected by them cope? And why is it so important that space be made for these communities to be at the centre of the process of rebuilding their lives and communities ?
Special Report    24 pages of text and photos from 11 countries in Asia coping with disasters.
From ACHR's workshop at WUF Nanjing.
Download from the Download Library here

 


Banner


TSUNAMI     RECOVERY


Why is People Centred Recovery Important ?

Earlier
16 PAGES of TSUNAMI UPDATES
THAILAND INDONESIA SRI LANKA INDIA
For People's Centred Perspective
News on the Tsunami in Asia please go 
HERE

 

YP TITLE
Working with the urban poor in Asia


UAC photos

Somsook Boonyabancha   Arif Hasan  Kirtee Shah
Understanding Asian Cities - resource page
Somsook Boonyabancha: Unlocking People Energy
Arif Hasan: Privatising Clifton Beach - and More
Kirtee Shah: India, Architects and the poor

"If the present trend continues then the rich-poor divide, evictions, informal settlements and exclusion will increase with not only the poor but also the rich living in ghettos surrounded by armed guards and security systems (this is already happening). "
New writing from Arif Hasan

What has happened with Asia's urban poor since 1987? Introduction HERE
Download the booklet Intro to Understanding Asian Cities from here
32 pages PDF file 1.6 megabytes - with photos



SAVINGS & CREDIT
& COMMUNITY FUNDS


A new way for development by people. A report on the international meeting held late last year in Bangkok, attending by grassroots teams and supporters from nearly 20 countries practicing savings and credit and using community funds as a the way forward for development by PEOPLE for PEOPLE.


“The world has changed and we need a new way to make more change possible - by people - and by a new system of flexible finance by people and from people. And this meeting is the biggest gathering of people who actually believe in this kind of new development. So it means something”


Somsook Boonyabancha.


Heritage
Tibet Heritage Fund - UNESCO Award HERE    Congratulations to Andre and the team

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hHAndre

 


Before the ACCA upgrading program started in 2009 ACHR had many communities in Asia preparing for comprehensive upgrading through the establishment of Savings and Credit Network in many countries

Below is earlier
NEWS on Savings Networks &
Up-grading in Urban Poor Asia
  

THAILAND - CAMBODIA - NEPAL - LAOS - VIETNAM - PHILIPPINES - MONGOLIA - INDIA - SRI LANKA - INDONESIA - EAST TIMOR   Here


To learn more
Download 52 pages of discussions. reports and transcripts from the meeting .
2.2.MG from the Download Library
here.

 

 


This home page is being reconstructed.

Apologies for any inconvenience




This site is updated as often as possible. Bear with us as we  become familiar with the new technology and experiment to see what works and does not.   
Much of our  material is written by friends for whom English is a second or third language and we thank them for their efforts. 

updates

ACHR HOMEPAGE continues HERE page 2


 

Before the emergence of ACHR there was no common forum or regular organising for NGO’s, professionals and grassroots groups working in Asian cities, despite an expressed need to share experiences, tackle the large problem of forced evictions in the regions cities, develop opportunities for organisations of the poor and consider their place in city planning. It was with these intentions that ACHR was formed in 1988. Since then, the links between coalition members have matured, regional programmes have been formalised and ACHR has become recognized as one of the most important players in urban poor development in the region by international agencies and urban actors.
The coalition is action-orientated, highly decentralised, and aims to provide an alternative model of urban development based on Asian realities and experiences. 

To learn more about ACHR as an organisation click the link About ACHR

Contact Information

ACHR coalition members are located throughout the countries of Asia. 
Contact details of our major focal points are available by clicking here
The Secretariat of ACHR is located in Bangkok, Thailand.

Phone 662 538 0919  Fax 662 539 9950     
73 Soi Sonthiwattana 4, Ladprao 110, Ladprao Rd Bangkok 10310, THAILAND