Shelter Cluster Nepal Position Paper Housing and Settlements Recovery
The 2015 Nepal earthquake has impacted the housing and settlements sectors the most, revealing several vulnerabilities in the building stock. Rehabilitation and reconstruction will bring new challenges but also opportunities to address shortcomings, increase skills, introduce improvements, and contribute to greater household and community resilience.
The housing sector is not only the largest but also among the earliest to start recovery activities as people take the initiative to salvage materials and start repairs and new construction as soon as they have the means to do so. Rebuilding 600,000 destroyed and 250,000 damaged houses across a wide geography will involve a massive recovery effort, requiring policies and systems to achieve scale in social mobilization, training, information, financing, materials, and quality assurance.