In September 2017, Arctic Infrastructure (AI) and the Heinrich Böll Stiftung Nigeria will host the ‘Lagos Development Envision Lab’, a residence training programme bringing together selected talented youth from informal settlements with young built environment professionals to share knowledge on alternative development strategies for the city of Lagos.
While the argument about the right model for developing Lagos persists, the capacity to understanding the fundamental challenges facing the city is inadequate. Many built environment practitioners cannot establish the reasons for slum proliferation; they cannot understand the presence of street vendors in the city nor fathom the reason why motorcycles (okada), keke (tricycles) and mini-buses (danfos) are prominent on the roads. Considerable number of urban planners, architects, cost estimators and land surveyors, among other built environment professionals, do not have a clear understanding of the city’s fundamental development challenges, hence their inability to initiate, create or develop appropriate measures. Many communities too do not see their unplanned and irregular neighborhoods as a challenge, hence their inability to make informed demands from governments at the service delivery level. While many residents in the slums and informal settlements have limited knowledge of the implications of their precarious communities, they also lack inventive measures to resolving the challenges. Without a proportional understanding of the problems in the city, solutions will remain inadequate and often counterproductive.
Applications
All applications should be addressed in a single file to Arctic Infrastructure on or before 31 May 2017.
Further information
Click here to download the call for applications document.
