Government approves strategy on housing for the poor

Laws - The prime minister has approved a national housing development strategy up to 2020 with a vision to 2030, with a specific aim to construct 10 million square meters of housing for low-income earners in the next four years.

Apartment buildings should be the most popular type of housing projects, accounting for over 80 percent of the total new housing units to be developed in Hanoi and HCM City, while the percentage would be 50 percent in first and second-grade cities and 30 percent in third-grade cities.

The housing strategy also sets a goal to build 12.5 million square meters of social housing in the 2016-2020 period, raising the minimum housing area to 25 square meters per capita nationwide, and 29 square meters in urban areas. It is expected that the national figure would surge to 30 square meters per capita by 2030.

To achieve such a goal, the government has established the Central Steering Committee for Housing Policy and Real Estate Market involving six ministries including the Ministry of Construction, the Ministry of Planning and Investment, the Ministry of Finance, and the Ministry of Labour, War Invalids and Social Affairs.

In addition, the investment procedures would be simplified to encourage investors to join apartment projects under the form of build-transfer (BT) and public-private partnerships (PPP).

Along with the land fund and tax policy, the national housing development strategy would pool capital from the State budget, government bonds, official development assistance (ODA) and other sources to achieve its target.