176. In the area of housing and land issues, in order to improve access to decent housing, Government built 6,792 social housing units nationwide, between 2002 and 2009. 177. Despite efforts by the State to facilitate access to property and housing, difficulties exist and are attributed, inter alia to: - Ignorance and disrespect of laws, regulations and procedures by the stakeholders of the sector; - Poor keeping of land register thereby rendering the consultation of land records difficult; - Inadequate land management tools. 178. The most notable consequences of this situation include: - land insecurity that has reached alarming proportions (duplication of titles, indiscriminate occupation of lands coupled with low investment incentive in the absence of secure and guaranteed rights over land); - the existence of numerous disputes, land disputes and underlying tensions resulting from conflicts over rights, land boundaries, sometimes accompanied by a worsening of the social environment. 179. To address this situation, the Government, through the Ministry of Housing, Land and Urban Development, held from 30 June 2008 to 11 December 2009, general forums on land, which brought together 4,618 representatives of all stakeholders involved in land issues, with the aim of preparing and implementing an appropriate land policy arrived at by consensus.. 180. The forums therefore reflected a political will to prioritize and strengthen the democratic debate on this very sensitive issue. These meetings led to the identification of four strategic areas: the adaptation of land laws and regulations to the country's socioeconomic context; the harmonization of the national land management with sectoral development policies; the establishment of appropriate tools for the said management and lastly, the capacity building of services and other institutions in charge of land. 181. The national housing strategy also estimated the housing needs to be 440,000 housing units by 2015. That is why the highest authorities in Mali decided to continue and even intensify the construction of social housing units. Hence, more than 20 000 housing units were developed during the period 2007 to 2012 all over the country in line with the Economic and Social Development Project (PDES), 5 400 units were developed by the State and the rest by real-estate developers within the framework of PublicPrivate Partnership (PPP). PART II: ECONOMIC, SOCIAL AND CULTURAL RIGHTS The right to work under fair and favourable conditions (Article 15) 182. Article 19 of the Constitution stipulates: "The right to work and to rest shall be recognized. It shall be equal for all. Work is a duty of every citizen, but no one may be forced to do a particular work except within the framework of rendering an exceptional 40