Regulatory Obstacles to Rapid and Equitable Emergency and Interim Shelter Solutions after Natural Disasters

The role of the international community in providing emergency and temporary shelter relief to those forced from their homes due to disaster is vital to securing the shelter needs of disaster affected persons, families and communities. What is less widely known, however, are the manifold housing, land and property (HLP) rights and other issues that frequently arise within the immediate and longer-term aftermaths of disaster, and which are often instrumental in determining the extent to which post-disaster shelter and related recovery succeeds and is able to be carried out rapidly and equitably. Indeed, these regulatory obstacles can seriously undermine the efforts of the humanitarian community to provide shelter to those in need.1 Each of these issues can also be determinative of the extent to which the rights of those affected by disaster are respected, protected and, ultimately, fulfilled and enforced.