Informal activities delivering formal housing: A case study of house-building industry in Ile-Ife, Nigeria

Abstract

The challenge of housing provision in the developing countries is quite enormous. Various efforts at addressing these problems have seen both the institutional and individual intervention in provision of residential housing. Informal players in the house-building industry are on the increase though their intervention in housing provision has been  downplayed as not having the required depth. In an effort to understand how informal activities in the housing subsector of the construction industry contribute to provisions of housing, this paper looks into the activities in the house-building industry and the product emanating from such  activities. Self-administered questionnaires were given to 242 house owners in the ancient city of Ile-Ife to elicit quantitative data. Also notable members of building artisanal associations were interviewed to obtain  qualitative data. All data were analysed using descriptive statistical tools and content analysis for quantitative and qualitative data respectively. Result showed that housing provision activities at the local level undergoes different stages of informal interactions and processes, yet the product were formal housing unit which were in no way inferior to the  institutionalized official government housing. Enabling environment should therefore be provided for these informal players in the house-building industry to contribute their quota in increasing housing unit in these areas.

Key words: artisans, house owner, house-building, informal housing