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Transport is traditionally a male-dominated sector. The realization that the sector and its subsystems have been conceived, designed, and matured from either a male-oriented or a gender-neutral perspective is thus unsurprising. In Kenya, discussion about gender and related aspects has been on the rise since the formulation of the Integrated National Transport Sector Policy (2009), which acknowledged that gender inequality exists in access and mobility, particularly in informal urban settlements in Kenya. There is ample potential for the transport sector to generate significant changes in women's productivity and empowerment, while ensuring equitable access to opportunities is offered for both men and women. This is what Kenya's Vision 2030, the country's blueprint for development, advocates for and is committed to enact. This study encompasses two independent analyses on mobility and employment in urban transport for the Kenyan capital context. Its findings are presented in two volumes. Volume 1 presents Mobility and Volume presents Employment.

Affordability --- Gender --- Mobility --- National Urban Development Policies and Strategies --- Urban Development --- Urban Transit

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This paper calculates and compares the minimum cost of a recommended diet across four countries in South Asia. The analysis finds that the cost of a recommended diet is highest in the smaller countries, such as Bhutan and Nepal, but because of differences in purchasing power, more households are unable to afford the cost of a recommended diet in India. Within countries, the cost and affordability vary across urban and rural areas, subnational areas, and seasons of the year. The cost of perishable food items, such as vegetables and fruits, drives the differences across subnational areas and seasons. In a context of constrained resources, this suggests the need for strategic prioritization of investments and service improvements in transport and storage of food and, more broadly, a rethink of food policies.

Agriculture --- Diet --- Dietary Recommendation --- Food Affordability --- Food and Nutrition Policy --- Food Policy --- Food Prices --- Health, Nutrition and Population --- Nutrition

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The availability and affordability of decent housing has become an important economic and social concern in the European Union (EU), as housing price increases in metropolitan regions have often outpaced wage increases. Housing is at the heart of growing economic divides in Europe. This is because productivity growth, which comes with higher wages and better jobs, is concentrated in cities and industrial clusters. Housing is unaffordable in metropolitan centers because the construction of new homes has not kept up with demand, reducing the standard of living of low-income households, and dissuading workers from moving to the most productive regions. While policy incentives have favored homeowners since the 1970s, less attention and resources have been devoted to easing the potential barriers and market restrictions that would allow housing supply to respond to increases in demand. Across EU member states, policymakers should focus on ensuring that land use, rental and other regulations are consistent with incentives to spur residential construction. The report highlights three key recommendations for EU policymakers: earmark unused public land for housing development and speed up approval processes; invest in greenfield projects with improved transportation links from suburban areas, to ensure cities cast a wider economic net; and create public registries to improve transparency of house sale prices to help greater competition between areas.

Affordability --- Housing --- Labor markets --- Living standards --- Mobility --- Municipal housing and land --- Poverty reduction --- Social protections and labor --- Tax policy --- Urban development --- Urban governance and management --- Urban housing --- Wages

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Despite being on average a relatively happy country, Colombia has a high level of inequality in subjective well-being. Using Gallup World Poll data for the period from 2010 to 2018, this paper tests the direction and strength of association of a range of objective and subjective factors with subjective well-being and explains differences in subjective well-being across individuals and space. The perceived welfare of the average Colombian is mainly influenced by conditions and expectations related to economic opportunities and education. However, quantile regressions, reveal substantial differences in the domains that matter to those at the bottom and top of the experienced welfare distribution. Standard-of-living improvements, housing affordability, and civic engagement matter more to the most fortunate top 20 percent, while having education, a job, sufficient income, economic security, and digital connectivity are much more strongly associated with the well-being of the bottom 20 percent. The life domains that matter more to the unhappiest respondents also explain the majority of the spatial differences in perceived welfare between residents in urban and rural areas as well as core and peripheral regions. Policy actions aimed at closing the gaps in these areas have the potential to increase well-being and reduce inequality in Colombia.

Civic Engagement --- Digital Connectivity --- Happiness --- Housing Affordability --- Income Inequality --- Inequality --- Life Satisfaction --- Living Standards --- Perceived Welfare --- Poverty Reduction --- Psychology --- Social Development --- Spatial Economics --- Spatial Inequality --- Subjective Well-Being

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Uzbekistan has one of the lowest rates of internal migration in the world, leading to persistent economic imbalances. Drawing from a unique monthly panel survey called Listening to the Citizens of Uzbekistan and a survey experiment, this paper focuses on two factors that prevent domestic mobility: (i) restrictive propiska registration policies, and (ii) the exceptionally high cost of urban housing. Registration rules prohibit migration to urban centers, and urban housing costs push up the cost of living to as much as 550 percent of the national average, levels severely unaffordable for almost all rural residents. But the proposed government reforms in 2019 to address these challenges are very popular. The results show that about 90 percent of people support lifting all registration restrictions and over 80 percent favor increasing urban housing construction. The results of the experiment show that reform popularity increases when propiska rules and housing costs are referenced in randomly assigned vignettes. However, views may also be sensitive to perceptions of fairness. Recent high-profile involuntary demolitions coincided with a doubling of the share responding that policies are unfair. The increase was further associated with declining optimism and lower support for the wider government national development program, beyond urbanization issues.

Affordability --- Communities and Human Settlements --- Housing --- Housing and Human Habitats --- Housing Construction --- Internal Migration --- Municipal Housing and Land --- National Development Plan --- National Urban Development Policies and Strategies --- Propiska --- Registration Policy --- Urban Development --- Urban Governance and Management --- Urban Housing --- Urbanization