Robust walls, a resilient home? How disaster reconstruction housing supply network contributes to the resilience of a disaster-affected community: Comparing formal and informal settlements

Team

In recent years, various studies have reported the occurrence of a wide range of antibiotics and antiretrovirals in different water systems. Of particular concern is the water emanating from wastewater treatment plants and informal settlements that have significant amounts of the drugs. These drugs end up in the water systems leading to a number of negative effects both terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. Much of the work with regard to the studies is in the developed world and there is no significant studies documented in the sub-Saharan Africa where there is high disease burden, high population and limited water treatment facilities. The goal of the present study is to develop fast and reliable analytical methods for the determination of selected antibiotics and antiretroviral drugs in water selected water systems in Kenya and Finland. The removal efficiencies of the wastewater treatments plants shall be determined. The data obtained in the study shall form the basis of research on pharmaceutical and other emerging contaminants in Kenya and the evaluation of the means for their elimination in water.

Team

Tuula Tuhkanen, Anthony Gachanja, Elijah Ngumba

Urban poverty in developing countries is fuelling the rapid growth of informal settlements which the UN defines as ‘slums’. Governments want to redevelop valuable slum land in the city centre for official and commercial purposes and to resettle slum dwellers to modern high-rise condominiums outside the city center, but target populations (former slum dwellers) are not always being reached by these programs. We focus on the cities of Addis Ababa and Dar es Salaam and ask: What are the exclusionary processes and forms of political economy that give rise to urban poverty in both of these cities? What are the best methods for understanding the lives of the highly mobile poor and elucidating the often hidden and invisible processes of resource flows, networking, and creation of privilege? More specifically, we investigate the reasons for why the poor are not being resettled in condominium housing, and whether the mismatch between the government’s original plan and the actual outcome arise from (a) policies and decisions which have, intentionally or unintentionally, excluded the urban poor, or from (b) the choices made by the poor themselves, because the new condominiums do not meet their needs (for livelihoods, social networks, access to services, etc. Our research methods are ethnographic: primarily in-depth, semi-structured interviews, including life history interviews.

Team

Prof. Laura Stark, Prof. Elias Yitbarek, Dr. Tiina-Riitta Lappi, Dr. Susanna Myllylä, MS Yonas Alemayehu, MS Imam Mahmoud, MA Jyri Mäkelä