OPP- RTI
Receives the World Habitat Award 2000
The year 2000 World Habitat Award has been
awarded to the Low Cost Sanitation and Housing Programme of the Orangi
Pilot Project - Research & Training Institute Karachi.
The World Habitat Awards were initiated in
1985 as part of the Building and Social Housing Foundation's
contribution to the United Nations International Year of Shelter for
the Homeless in 1987. The principle objective of the international
year was for every nation to draw up strategies, policies and
programmes that would enable practical and attainable improvements
to be made in the shelter and neighbourhoods of all poor and
disadvantaged people by the year 2000. The World Habitat Awards were
initiated in order to identify innovative and successful human
settlements projects throughout the world which could be replicated
elsewhere.
This year the international judges for this
award were unanimous in their decision to select Orangi Pilot
Project - Research and Training Institute as the winner of the World
Habitat Award 2000 for its successful community financed, community
managed infrastructure upgrading programme which has helped over two
million people improve their sanitation, health and housing
conditions in Orangi, in 49 other settlements in Karachi and in 5
other Pakistani cities.
The OPP-RTI programmes have moved on from
neighbouhood to the city level and from being community initiatives
to becoming community government partnerships. The OPP-RTI now links
up community efforts with the work of the Sindh Katchi Abadis
Authority (SKAA) and Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC). In
Lodhran the OPP-RTI strategies are being replicated by the city
government with OPP-RTI support. The OPP-RTI methodology has
influenced programmes in South Africa, Central Asia, Nepal, Sri
Lanka. Training groups have visited OPP-RTI from all over Pakistan
and from Vietnam , Cambodia, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Philippines,
Zimbabwe, South Africa, India, Central Asia .
The award will be presented to the OPP on
1st October 2001 at Fakuaka, Japan and OPP-RTI Director Perween
Rahman will receive it.
Urban Resource Centre
3/48 Mualimabad Jamal uddin Afghani Road off Khalid Bin Walid
Road
Karachi 74800
Pakistan
Tel 92 21 4559275 Fax 92 21 4384288
E-mail urc@inet.com.pk
Web site www.urckarachi.org
and www.achr.net
