So, I have an overlooked but potentially lucrative investment opportunity for you. Over the past 10 years in the UK, the return on burial plots has outperformed the UK property market by a ratio of around three to one. There are private cemeteries being set up with plots for sale to investors, and they start at around 3,900 pounds. And they're projected to achieve about 40 percent growth. The biggest advantage is that this is a market with continuous demand.
Imam za vas zanemarenu, ali potencijalno unosnu priliku za investiciju. Tokom proteklih deset godina u Ujedinjenom Kraljevstvu, zarada od grobnih mesta prevazišla je tržište nekretnina u razmeri od oko tri prema jedan. Otvaraju se privatna groblja sa parcelama na prodaju za investitore, a cene kreću od oko 3900 funti i očekuje se da dostignu rast od oko 40 odsto. Najveća prednost je to što je ovo tržište sa neprekidnom potražnjom.
Now, this is a real proposition, and there are companies out there that really are offering this investment, but my interest in it is quite different. I'm an architect and urban designer, and for the past year and a half, I've been looking at approaches to death and dying and at how they've shaped our cities and the buildings within them.
Ovo je pravi predlog i postoje kompanije koje zaista nude ovakve investicije, ali je moje interesovanje prilično drugačije. Ja sam arhitekta i urbana dizajnerka, i proteklih godinu i po posmatrala sam kako pristupamo smrti i umiranju i kako su oblikovali naše gradove i građevine u njima.
So in the summer, I did my first exhibition on death and architecture in Venice, and it was called "Death in Venice." And because death is a subject that many of us find quite uncomfortable to talk about, the exhibition was designed to be quite playful, so that people would literally engage with it. So one of our exhibits was an interactive map of London which showed just how much of the real estate in the city is given over to death. As you wave your hand across the map, the name of the piece of real estate -- the building or the cemetery -- is revealed. And those white shapes that you can see, they're all of the hospitals and hospices and mortuaries and cemeteries in the city. In fact, the majority are cemeteries. We wanted to show that, even though death and burial are things that we might not think about, they're all around us, and they're important parts of our cities.
Letos sam održala svoju prvu izložbu o smrti i arhitekturi u Veneciji, a zvala se „Smrt u Veneciji“. Budući da je smrt tema o kojoj je mnogima neprijatno da razgovaraju, izložba je bila osmišljena da bude prilično razigrana - da bi ljudi bukvalno mogli da se uključe. Tako je jedan od naših eksponata bila interaktivna mapa Londona koja je pokazivala koliko je tačno nekretnina u gradu dato smrti. Dok prelazite rukom preko mape, ime dela nekretnine - zgrade ili groblja - se pokaže. Beli oblici koje vidite, sve su to bolnice, domovi za teško obolele, mrtvačnice i groblja u gradu. Zapravo, većina su groblja. Hteli smo da pokažemo da, iako su smrt i sahrane nešto o čemu možda ne razmišljamo, one su svuda oko nas i važan su deo naših gradova.
So about half a million people die in the UK each year, and of those, around a quarter will want to be buried. But the UK, like many Western European countries, is running out of burial space, especially in the major cities. And the Greater London Authority has been aware of this for a while, and the main causes are population growth, the fact that existing cemeteries are almost full. There's a custom in the UK that graves are considered to be occupied forever, and there's also development pressure -- people want to use that same land to build houses or offices or shops.
Oko pola miliona ljudi godišnje umre u Ujedinjenom Kraljevstvu, i od njih, oko četvrtina će želeti da bude sahranjena. Međutim, u Ujedinjenom Kraljevstvu, kao i u mnogim državama Zapadne Evrope, ponestaje mesta za sahranjivanje, pogotovo u većim gradovima. Uprava šireg Londona je svesna ovoga već neko vreme, a glavni uzroci su rast populacije, činjenica da su postojeća groblja skoro puna. Postoji običaj u Britaniji da se smatra da su grobovi zauvek zauzeti, a postoji i pritisak novogradnje - ljudi žele da koriste to isto zemljište da grade kuće, kancelarije ili prodavnice.
So they came up with a few solutions. They were like, well, maybe we can reuse those graves after 50 years. Or maybe we can bury people, like, four deep, so that four people can be buried in the same plot, and we can make more efficient use of the land that way, and in that way, hopefully London will still have space to bury people in the near future.
Tako su došli do novih rešenja. Pomislili su da možda možemo da koristimo grobove posle 50 godina. Ili možemo da zakopamo ljude učetvoro, tako da njih četvoro može da se sahrani u istoj parceli, i tako efikasnije možemo da iskoristimo zemlju, i na taj način će, nadamo se, London i dalje imati mesta za sahranjivanje ljudi u bližoj budućnosti.
But, traditionally, cemeteries haven't been taken care of by the local authority. In fact, the surprising thing is that there's no legal obligation on anyone in the UK to provide burial space. Traditionally, it's been done by private and religious organizations, like churches and mosques and synagogues. But there's also occasionally been a for-profit group who has wanted to get in on the act. And, you know, they look at the small size of a burial plot and that high cost, and it looks like there's serious money to be made.
Međutim, tradicionalno, o grobljima se lokalne vlasti nisu starale. Zapravo, iznenađujuće je da ne postoji pravna obaveza da iko u Ujedinjenom Kraljevstvu obezbeđuje grobna mesta. Tradicionalno, to su obavljale privatne i religijske organizacije, poput crkava, džamija i sinagoga. Međutim, povremeno je bilo i profitnih organizacija koje su htele da se uključe. Znate, vide malu veličinu grobnog mesta i tako visoku cenu, i deluje kao da može da se zaradi ozbiljan novac.
So, actually, if you want to go out and start your own cemetery, you kind of can. There was this couple in South Wales, and they had a farmhouse and a load of fields next to it, and they wanted to develop the land. They had a load of ideas. They first thought about making a caravan park, but the council said no. And then they wanted to make a fish farm and again the council said no. Then they hit on the idea of making a cemetery and they calculated that by doing this, they could increase the value of their land from about 95,000 pounds to over one million pounds.
Tako da, ako želite da se pojavite i otvorite svoje groblje, zapravo možete. Bio je jedan par u Južnom Velsu; imali su farmu i gomilu polja do nje, i hteli su da razviju zemljište. Imali su gomilu ideja. Prvo su mislili da naprave kamp za prikolice, ali je veće reklo ne. Zatim su hteli da naprave ribnjak i veće je opet reklo ne. Onda su došli na ideju da naprave groblje i izračunali su da bi time mogli da povećaju vrednost svog zemljišta sa oko 95 000 funti na preko milion.
But just to come back to this idea of making profit from cemeteries, like, it's kind of ludicrous, right? The thing is that the high cost of those burial plots is actually very misleading. They look like they're expensive, but that cost reflects the fact that you need to maintain the burial plot -- like, someone has to cut the grass for the next 50 years. That means it's very difficult to make money from cemeteries. And it's the reason that normally they're run by the council or by a not-for-profit group. But anyway, the council granted these people permission, and they're now trying to build their cemetery.
No, doći na ovu ideju zarađivanja na groblju, nekako je suludo, zar ne? Stvar je u tome što visoka cena tih grobnih mesta zapravo veoma obmanjuje. Deluju kao da su skupa, ali cena oslikava činjenicu da mesto mora da se održava - neko mora da kosi travu narednih 50 godina. To znači da je veoma teško zarađivati od groblja, i to je razlog što ih obično vodi veće ili neprofitna organizacija. U svakom slučaju, veće je ovim ljudima odobrilo zahtev, i sada pokušavaju da izgrade svoje groblje.
So just to explain to you kind of how this works: If I want to build something in the UK, like a cemetery for example, then I have to apply for planning permission first. So if I want to build a new office building for a client or if I want to extend my home or, you know, if I have a shop and I want to convert it into an office, I have to do a load of drawings, and I submit them to the council for permission. And they'll look at things like how it fits in the surroundings. So they'll look at what it looks like. But they'll also think about things like what impact is it going to have on the local environment? And they'll be thinking about things like, is this thing going to cause pollution or is there going to be a lot of traffic that wants to go to this thing that I've built? But also good things. Is it going to add local services like shops to the neighborhood that local people would like to use? And they'll weigh up the advantages and the disadvantages and they'll make a decision.
Da vam samo objasnim kako to funkcioniše. Ako želim nešto da izgradim u Britaniji, groblje, na primer, prvo moram da se prijavim za plansku dozvolu. Ako želim da izgradim novu poslovnu zgradu za klijenta ili da proširim kuću ili ako imam radnju i želim da je preuredim u kancelariju, moram da nacrtam gomilu crteža i podnesem ih veću na odobrenje. Oni će obratiti pažnju na to kako se uklapa u okolinu. Gledaće kako izgleda. Takođe će misliti i o tome kako će uticati na lokalno okruženje. I misliće o tome da li će izazivati zagađenje ili da li će biti mnogo saobraćaja ka tome što pravim. Ipak, gledaće i dobre stvari. Da li će lokalnoj zajednici doneti usluge poput prodavnica koje bi meštani voleli da koriste. Vagaće prednosti i mane i doneće odluku.
So that's how it works if I want to build a large cemetery. But what if I've got a piece of land and I just want to bury a few people, like five or six? Well, then -- actually, I don't need permission from anyone! There's actually almost no regulation in the UK around burial, and the little bit that there is, is about not polluting water courses, like not polluting rivers or groundwater. So actually, if you want to go and make your own mini-cemetery, then you can.
Tako to izgleda ako hoću da sagradim veliko groblje. Međutim, šta ako imam parče zemlje i hoću da sahranim samo nekoliko ljudi, pet ili šest? Pa, ako je tako - zapravo, ne treba mi ničija dozvola! Ne postoje gotovo nikakva pravila o sahranjivanju u Ujedinjenom Kraljevstvu, a i to malo što ih ima, je o tome da se ne zagade vodeni tokovi, poput reka i podzemnih voda. Tako da, ako želite da napravite sopstveno mini-groblje, možete. Ali, mislim, stvarno, ko to radi? Zar ne?
But I mean, like -- really, who does this? Right? Well, if you're an aristocratic family and you have a large estate, then there's a chance that you'll have a mausoleum on it, and you'll bury your family there. But the really weird thing is that you don't need to have a piece of land of a certain size before you're allowed to start burying people on it. And so that means that, technically, this applies to, like, the back garden of your house in the suburbs.
Pa, ako ste aristokratska porodica i imate ogromno imanje, svi su izgledi da ćete na njemu imati mauzolej, i tamo ćete sahraniti porodicu. No, najčudnije je to što ne morate imati zemljište određene veličine da biste počeli da sahranjujete ljude na njemu. Ovo praktično znači da se to odnosi i na dvorište vaše kuće u predgrađu.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
So what if you wanted to try this yourself at home? Well, there's a few councils that have guidance on their website which can help you.
Šta ako hoćete da probate ovo sami kod kuće? Postoji nekoliko veća koja na svom sajtu imaju savete koji mogu da vam pomognu.
So, the first thing that they tell you is that you need to have a certificate of burial before you can go ahead -- you're not allowed to just murder people and put them under the patio.
Prva stvar koju vam kažu je da prvo morate imati potvrdu o sahranjivanju - ne smete da ubijete ljude i gurnete ih pod dvorište.
(Laughter)
(Smeh)
They also tell you that you need to keep a record of where the grave is. But that's pretty much it for formal requirements. Now, they do warn you that your neighbors might not like this, but, legally speaking, there's almost nothing that they can do about it. And just in case any of you still had that profit idea in your mind about how much those burial plots cost and how much money you might be able to make, they also warn that it might cause the value of your house to drop by 20 percent. Although, actually, it's more likely that no one will want to buy your house at all after that.
Kažu vam i da morate da vodite evidenciju gde se nalazi grob, ali to je manje-više sve što se tiče formalnih zahteva. Istina, upozore vas da se ovo možda neće dopasti komšijama, ali, pravno govoreći, ne mogu gotovo ništa da urade povodom toga. I, za slučaj da neki od vas još imaju ideju o zaradi, vezano za to koliko koštaju ta grobna mesta, a koliko biste mogli da zaradite, takođe vas upozore da bi vrednost vaše kuće mogla da padne za 20 odsto. Mada je, zapravo, verovatnije da niko neće ni hteti da je kupi posle toga.
So what I find fascinating about this is the fact that it kind of sums up many of our attitudes towards death. In the UK, and I think that the figures across Europe are probably similar, only about 30 percent of people have ever talked to anyone about their wishes around death, and even for people over 75, only 45 percent of people have ever talked about this. And the reasons that people give ... you know, they think that their death is far off or they think that they're going to make people uncomfortable by talking about it. And you know, to a certain extent, there are other people out there who are taking care of things for us. The government has all this regulation and bureaucracy around things like burying a death, for example, and there's people like funeral directors who devote their entire working lives to this issue. But when it comes to our cities and thinking about how death fits in our cities, there's much less regulation and design and thought than we might imagine.
Ono što me ovde fascinira je što ovo na neki način sumira mnoge naše stavove prema smrti. U Ujedinjenom Kraljevstvu, a mislim da su brojke verovatno slične širom Evrope, svega oko 30 odsto ljudi je sa nekim razgovaralo o svojim željama vezanim za smrt, i čak i od ljudi starijih od 75, samo 45 odsto je pričalo o ovome. I razlog što ljudi... znate, misle da je njihova smrt daleko ili misle da će ljudima biti neprijatno ako pričaju o tome. I znate, donekle, postoje drugi ljudi koji se umesto nas pobrinu za stvari. Vlada ima sva ova pravila i birokratiju za stvari poput sahranjivanja, na primer, i postoje pogrebnici, koji čitav radni vek posvete ovim problemima. Međutim, što se tiče naših gradova i toga kako se smrt uklapa u naše gradove, postoji mnogo manje pravila i planiranja i mozganja nego što pretpostavljamo.
So we're not thinking about this, but all of the people we imagine are thinking about it -- they're not taking care of it either.
Dakle, mi ne razmišljamo o ovome, ali svi ljudi za koje smatramo da misle o tome - takođe se ne brinu o tome.
Thank you.
Hvala.
(Applause)
(Aplauz)