Over 100 experts address the global housing crisis in Barcelona
Anne Hidalgo, Anna Minton and Anacláudia Rossbach, headline HOWS Barcelona
HOWS Barcelona – Housing World Summit, the new international platform for urban housing strategy hosted and promoted by Barcelona City Council and organized by Fira de Barcelona, will bring together governments, cities, social and private real estate developers, third-sector and non-profit organizations, academia and institutions from 3 to 5 November at the Gran Via venue. Held alongside Smart City Expo World Congress, it will feature Anne Hidalgo, former Mayor of Paris and Global Ambassador of the Global Covenant of Mayors for Climate & Energy; Anna Minton, author and Reader in Architecture at the University of East London; and Anacláudia Rossbach, Executive Director of UN-Habitat.
The summit arrives at a time when housing has become critical urban infrastructure and one of the defining challenges of our cities. More than 300 million people worldwide have no shelter, 3 billion live in inadequate housing and a global affordability crisis keeps growing, according to data from UN Habitat, the United Nations agency for human settlements.
Anne Hidalgo, the first woman elected Mayor of Paris, led the French capital for two terms and now champions, as Global Ambassador of the Global Covenant of Mayors, an agenda that includes climate finance for cities and affordable and sustainable housing.
Anna Minton brings to the debate a critical perspective on the financialization of land, property and housing. Author of Ground Control: Fear and Happiness in the Twenty-First-Century City and Big Capital: Who Is London For?, the Reader in Architecture at the University of East London researches the privatization of public space, gentrification and the housing crisis, and is a regular contributor to The Guardian and the Financial Times.
Rossbach brings to Barcelona the global perspective of UN Habitat on this matter. Elected by the UN General Assembly in 2024, the Brazilian urbanist has more than twenty years of experience in housing and urban policy, with a career that spans the World Bank, Cities Alliance and the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy, and a particular focus on informal settlements and social housing.
The summit will also feature representatives of social real estate developers, third-sector and non-profit organizations such as Carme Arcarazo, spokesperson at the Sindicat de Llogateres; and Jordi Galvez, President of the Federació de Cooperatives d’Habitatge de Catalunya.
The Mayor of Barcelona, Jaume Collboni, will host the Housing Mayors’ Roundtable where the right to stay and the policies being implemented around the world to respond to the global housing crisis will be discussed. The mayors of Milan, Giuseppe Sala; Budapest, Gergely Karácsony; Athens, Haris Doukas; and Atlanta, Andre Dickens, will participate, as well as Eamon Ryan, President of the European Commission’s Housing Advisory Council. In addition, the event will host the Housing Mayors’ Meeting, a closed-door working session bringing together mayors and senior housing officials from international cities.
Five pillars for a shared challenge
The congress program is structured around five key topics – Urban Planning & Land Policy, Housing Regulation, Social and Affordable Housing, Building Innovation, and Renovation, Retrofit & Reuse – that address every dimension of housing, from planning and finance to construction and regulation.
Over three days, the HOWS Barcelona Stage will move from land availability, with sessions on public land, land banking and the activation of underused sites, to the regulation of a rental market strained by tourism and speculation. Public housing systems, cooperative and co-housing models and new financing schemes based on public-private partnerships and institutional investment will share the stage with industrialized construction, the climate transition of buildings and the rehabilitation of existing stock.
Global Urban Innovation Platform
HOWS Barcelona and Smart City Expo World Congress will be held alongside Tomorrow.Mobility World Congress, organized by Fira de Barcelona and EIT Urban Mobility, which promotes a new paradigm for sustainable urban mobility; Tomorrow.Blue Economy, focused on the sustainable use of ocean resources; the Barcelona Deep Tech Summit, dedicated to scientific and technology-based entrepreneurship; and the Barcelona Cybersecurity Congress.