Rural poverty and housing

Around 1.2 billion people, or 75% of the world's poor, live in rural areas. Low-income families often lack access to education, health care and decent, affordable housing. For many it is a long walk from their home to school, to collect water or to go to a health centre.

The facts
Ibrahim's story, Egypt

A substandard home in the Dominican Republic.

The facts

Poverty in Africa is predominantly rural. 70% of rural populations in West and Central Africa are poor. In South and East Africa, 145 million people live in poverty – roughly 75% of the rural population.

Sub-Saharan Africa is home to over 60% of people infected by HIV. By 2015, five to ten million deaths are expected each year.

Two-thirds of the world's poor live in Asia.

In South Asia, 31% of the population live on US $1 per day, down from 41 percent in 1990. In East Asia and the Pacific, 16 percent live on US $1 per day, down from 30 percent in 1990.

In all countries within the Asia and the Pacific region, except Mongolia, poverty is concentrated in rural areas.

A study of rural and urban poverty in Europe found that while the urban poor were twice as numerous as the rural poor, the level of poverty was worse in rural areas.

In the Latin America and the Caribbean area, income distribution is the most unequal in the world. The richest 10% of the population earn 48% of the income, while the poorest 10% earn less than 2% of income.

Facts from Habitat for Humanity International Taking Measure Report 2005

A new room for Ibrahim and his family.

Ibrahim's story, Egypt

While Habitat for Humanity in Egypt operates in one of the world's most congested cities, Cairo, it builds primarily in rural communities throughout the country. With an estimated 20 million of Egypt's 73 million people living in poverty, the task is huge.

Ibrahim was living with his wife in a rural Egyptian village. They were sharing a single room measuring 74 square feet with their cow. They had to protect the cow because it represented their livelihood.

"We had to sleep near the cow," 52-year-old Ibrahim explained, "because I was afraid that somebody would steal it from me."

Ibrahim's house had no latrine, no electricity or clean water and the mud-brick walls were falling down.

Through a partnership with Habitat for Humanity Egypt, Ibrahim has now built a second room, separate quarters for the cow and even an indoor latrine.

"Habitat did a lot," he says, referring to his house and the Al-Kom Al-Akdar community in general. "They made it beautiful rather than how it used to be: very, very bad."

Hany Raouf, field coordinator for HFH Egypt, says the emergence of better housing in the community is about more than improving a physical structure here or there. "It has created a strong cultural atmosphere where good housing is desired, sought and received by all."