By Nonima Aman Oni
Homelessness crisis is a burning issue in the whole world. Homelessness means not having a stable, safe and private place to live. We can see people sleeping on streets, on park benches or under lamp post in almost every city of the earth. This proves that homelessness affects every category of man. Though it is hard to track the number but homelessness crisis is increasing each year at a pace.
Homelessness reflects the mirror of poverty, discrimination and inequality of one country. This affects every background man including women and children. According to United Nations, “There are around 1.6 billion people residing in poor housing worldwide, with around 15 million being forcibly evicted each year”. So living in a rich country or healthy economy can’t guarantee “homelessness immune”.
If we look around us, we can see that homeless crisis is not happening in one day or is a sudden action. There are many factors working behind this issue. As for example we can say about poverty. Poverty plays a primary role in this issue. Poverty makes one unable to afford a safe and stable housing which later results in homelessness. Then a country’s one of the biggest curse is unemployment. An unemployed citizen cant ensure its accommodation and dive into homeless crisis. Another vital factor can be stated is war. War never cause any goodness to anyone in maximum time. In recent time if we look around we can see how Israel is demolishing Palestine. They are destroying everything and killing invariable to any gender amd childrens as if to erase a nation from the bottom. So this will create a huge homeless crisis in the world. And millions of peole will have no place to live and thus become a refugees in its own country. Natural calamities also create this crisis at a large scale. Virtually almost every country has a homeless population.
According to World Population Review here is a glance of some top countries who has the highest number of homeless population. Nigeria has the world’s highest number of homeless people. Nigeria has total 218.5 million population where 24.4 million people are homeless. Syria has the highest homeless rate with one-third – roughly 29.6% – of the country’s 22 million population being homeless. According to the UN, 70% of Syrians lack access to potable water because of infrastructural failure. A further 9 million people lack sufficient food, with 1 million being in danger of becoming hungry. Put together, these conditions point towards an increase in homeless people in Syria. The United States Department of Housing and Urban Development has estimated that approximately 18 out of 10,000 Americans, or 582,000 people in total, were homeless in 2022. From 2020 to 2022 in 27 out of 50 states, the number of homeless people rose, while in the remaining 23 states and the District of Columbia, it fell.
On the other hand there are countries like finland, japan, Iceland with lowest rate of homelessness crisis and homeless population. According to World Population people, Iceland, with only 349 persons per night, has the lowest homeless population on the European continent and one of the lowest in the world. In 2018, the nation announced that tackling homelessness was a priority, with one of the goals being to build homes for homeless people Finland is known across the world for its work to end homelessness via its Housing First policy. The country’s 0.08% rate of homelessness has been in the news for some time The latest data shows that 3,950 homeless people were living in Finland at the end of 2021, a decrease of 390 compared to the previous year At 0.003% or roughly 1 homeless person per 34,000 residents, Japan is the country with the world’s lowest rate of homelessness. Moreover, with a population of around 125.7 million people, the country also has one of the lowest numbers of homeless people.
Bangladesh has approximately five million homeless population in its total population which is considered as 3% of the the total population. Bangladesh is a developing country with a vulnerable economy. So it is not a easy task to ensur every citizen’s accommodation facilities. Natural disasters also play a role in this crisis and increase the ratio of homeless population each year.
The world is facing huge homeless population due to its conflicts and suffering greatly. We shouldn’t sit around idly and let our fellow brother and sister to suffer alone. The world’s leader along with citizens can take many sustainable measures to minimize this obstacle. For example: We can take housing first initiative. This will provide a long term house without any conditions to the people who experienced homeless crisis. Then welfare housing can help ending homeless crisis by investing in construction, maintenance and purchase it. And Cross Government Strategy will also help us to tackle the isue. Moreover,Unemployment problem must be solved soon to handle homeless crisis. If we can make homes more affordable and accessible to those who need them most then we can hope to minimize this crisis at a good rate in future.
Finding sustainable solutions for homelessness crisis isn’t a easy task. There are so many things going around the world and accomodation problem is one of them. One can’t solve this problem in one day. We have to united and conscious about our people and world. We
need to sacrifice our personal lust and profits for greater mankind. If the causes of homeless can be solved efficiently then the Problem of homeless will be minimized soon. And in true sense the world will be the home of our human civilization.
The writer is a member of the Social Research Group (SRG) and an undergraduate student of Public Administration at Comilla University, Bangladesh. The article is a work in progress.
