Housing Market Pressures from Climate Migration: A Study of Informal Settlements in Urban Pakistan

The Global South has been witnessing a rapid urban sprawl for over two decades, a demographic shift which has greatly worsened the housing market pressures in these developing nations. In Pakistan, as the demand immensely outweighs the supply of affordable housing in urban districts, Informal Subdivisions of Government Land (ISDs or katchi abadis) and Informal Subdivisions of Agricultural Land (ISALs or slums) have proliferated on the outskirts of every major city in the country. Compounded with the issue of extreme climatic changes in the region, which have created a ripple effect, escalating rural-to-urban internal migration at an alarming level, an unprecedented crunch on the housing market has been formed due a demand shock. To this date, the housing crisis stands largely unmonitored and under-documented on part of the appropriate government authorities. With the lack of suitable, efficient and implementable policy frameworks to cater to the growing housing crisis, and the multitude of socio-economic dilemmas created by this shortage as a result, there is a pressing need in popular discourse to investigate the effects of climate-induced internal migration on Pakistan’s peri-urban centers against the backdrop of a burgeoning population it is ill- equipped to cater to. The study adopts a maximalist approach towards climate change and its adverse effects on the disenfranchised community of rural Pakistan, and considers climate-induced migration typology to be the primary reason for the escalated resettlements in recent times, causing a population explosion in the urban and peri-urban areas, including ISALs and ISDs. The following study sets to investigate and highlight the multifaceted aspects of housing market pressures in Pakistan’s urban and peri-urban milieu, which are continuously worsening with the increasing migration from rural areas. Furthermore, this paper attempts to contribute to the existing discourse by identifying the gaps in the current economic policy frameworks with regards to climate-induced expansions of informal settlements.