By CHARLES IWUOHA

The Nigeria Institute of Architects (NIA) has raised the alarm over the soaring housing supply deficit in the country, especially in the urban areas.

The Institute said the situation has led to increase in slums in many cities across the country and predicted that if nothing urgent not done to address the situation, many cities would turn to slums by 2050.

Professor Ibem Eziyi, former head, Department of Architecture, University of Nigeria, Nsukka (UNN), stated this in Abakaliki, Ebonyi State capital at a symposium organized by the Ebonyi State chapter of the Institute.

The theme of the symposium was " bridging the housing deficit: collaborative strategies for sustainable low-cost housing delivery in Nigeria".

He observed that in most cities in Nigeria, people living in slums, substandard housing environment that is not worth living which he said was affecting their health, well-being and productivity.

"Nigeria is a fast urbanizing country and it is one of the leading urbanizing country in sub-Saharan Africa and is estimated that by 2050, Nigeria's population will be more than 400million which is just about the 3rd in the whole world just behind India and we have been having huge housing supply deficit especially in the urban areas.

"This is why many Nigerians, the low income earners are struggling to ensure that they have adequate accommodation and because of that, we have been having a lot of slums developing in all our urban areas

"If you look around, in most cities in Nigeria, you will find slums, people living in substandard housing environment that is not even worth living in and you will see that these conditions are actually affecting their health, their well-being and productivity which is why we are in dire need of solutions that will help these categories of citizens to have access to adequate housing.

"So, with the rate we are going, if something is not done, we will find out that majority of our cities will be slums by 2050 and many of our citizens will live in a more deplorable housing situation", he stated.

He called for scale up of public-private partnership, promotion of cooperative housing schemes, integration of indigenous building materials, streamlining of land tenure systems, simplifying approval process among other measures to address the housing deficit in the country.

In his address, the state Chairman of NIA, Arc Emmanuel Udoniaye, said the theme of the symposium was not merely academic exercise but a direct challenge to the social and economic well-being of the nation and the response of the Architects which he described as swift, innovative, and sustainable.