Gender And Involvement In Housing Development In Ibadan, Nigeria

Though women are the major consumers of housing services, their perception and actual behaviour with respect to their involvement in housing development have been invisible in existing studies. Therefore, the study investigate variations in the general perception of women's involvement, women's level of awareness and actual involvement in housing development in Ibadan with emphasis on six critical aspects of housing development namely: land acquisition and preparation, housing design and planning, housing finance, actual construction of the building, production/procurement of building materials, and housing maintenance. Also examined are women's views on the responsibility for households housing provision and perception on jobs of building activities. The study uses primary data which were obtained through a cross-sectional survey of 721 households systematically carried out in Ibadan, Nigeria. Statistical techniques such as frequencies, percentages, analysis of variance (ANOVA) and Least Significance Difference (LSD) Post Hoc test were used to analyze the data. The result of the analysis shows that there is, generally, low involvement of women in housing development. The general perception of women is that housing provisions are the responsibilities of male heads of households. Building activities are viewed more as men's job. Significant intra-urban variation does not exist in the perception, awareness and in the actual involvement of women in each of the critical aspects of housing development. However, among each of these critical aspects women are found to be more involved in housing maintenance activities. The study suggests that women's empowerment in housing delivery will be greatly enhanced through a reorientation of women's mindset about responsibility for housing provision. Keywords: gender, housing development, Ibadan, NigeriaGender & Behaviour Vol. 6 (2) 2008: pp. 1982-200