adsInstitutional economist and global policy advocate, Elena Panaritis, has said that informality or informal settlement has trapped nearly 70 percent of the world’s population, creating a cycle of poverty, homelessness, insecurity and economic exclusion that now threatens both developing nations and the global middle class.
Panaritis spoke at a private, exclusive screening held in Lagos, where she unveiled the international ‘70 percent Informals’ documentary aimed at exposing the human and economic consequences of global informality.
Panaritis noted millions of people across the world live without formal property rights, legal identity or access to economic opportunities, forcing families into slums, child labour and extreme suffering. According to her, informality was never a choice for most people but a condition they were born into because governments failed to provide functioning institutional systems.
“Informality is touching the world’s middle class; it is affecting everybody. It is a shame,” Panaritis said. “Families live in homes without roofs, children are pushed into labour, and policymakers lack the tools to tackle the problem because they fail to identify the root cause. Informality was not a choice; people were born into it.”
