Social housing construction is in its first phase in the country and the Government continues improving related policies for this housing type’s development, said Minister of Construction Trinh Dinh Dung on the sideline of a ministry’s conference yesterday.
According to Minister Dung, 102 housing projects have been built so far in Vietnam, supplying 20,000 apartments for low income people.
Another 150 projects have been under construction. Of these, 91 projects with 55,830 apartments will be for low income laborers and the rest ones will be for workers and students.
Last year the country built an extra of 0.8 million square meters of social houses equivalent to 12,000 apartments, taking the total social housing area to about 1.8 million square meters nationwide.
At first the VND30 trillion (U$1.4 billion) credit package for social housing projects had been implemented slowly. Its disbursement rate in the second half last year was double it in the phase from last June to before.
The disbursement rate most increased after the Government loosened loan conditions permitting more people to access the credit package and extending loan time. Besides several new social housing projects have been implemented raising the supply for the market.
Vietnam’s GDP per capita is nearly US$2,000 per year. Nations with a median income of US$50,000 a person per year still need social houses. Therefore social housing must be a long term plan, Mr. Dung said.
Social housing demand is very high and about 80 percent of residents need the Government’s assistances to buy social houses, according to estimation by the Construction Ministry.
