Learning from those who are most at risk: Informal settlement fires in South Africa

This paper describes a project that brought together government stakeholders, members of an informal settlement community, academics from different disciplines, and the private sector to identify alarms appropriate for the conditions in informal dwellings and test their large-scale rollout in a settlement in Cape Town, South Africa. Uncontrolled informal dwelling (shack) fires are a significant threat to the lives and well-being of poorer communities across the Global South. In South Africa, shack fires occur every day, killing and injuring hundreds of people each year, destroying livelihoods and deepening poverty.

The project drew on the capacities of each of the partners to co-create and shape the collaboration, which also sought to strengthen community-level capacity and leadership to promote broader development goals. The project provided important insights into not only the effectiveness of using smoke alarms in informal settlements but also a collaborative governance approach to making communities safer.