Parts of a loan fund raised originally for a road rehabilitation programme by the previous administration is now being re-shifted to the housing sector for its expansion.
Minister of Finance, Winston Jordan disclosed that the government is working with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) to re-programme the housing sector’s over US$30 Million from a loan approved in 2012, under the previous administration.
The Finance Minister who was at the time addressing the official launch of the Ministry of Communities’ Housing Solutions 2017 and Beyond, programme at Perseverance on East Bank Demerara (EBD), explained that the loan was for a road rehabilitation programme that included the upgrade and widening of the Sheriff Street/Mandela Avenue.
He explained that this loan has been plagued by a number of problems, resulting in an extremely poor rate of disbursement. Further, the life of the loan will end in March 2018, resulting in the loss of significant concessional resources.
The Minister said that instead of facing the loss, the government has decided to re-programme the funds to expand the housing sector, as part of developing new revenue sources for the industry.
The more than $30M will augment the $5 Billion that is expected to be spent in the sector this year, realising the first phase of the Housing Solutions 2017 and beyond programme. Further the money will serve to offset some of the housing supply shortfall, that the country has been experiencing, the minister said.
Jordan added that the, “housing supply in Guyana has not kept pace with underlying demand.”
He said that the accumulated shortfall was due to factors such as the restrictions on the supply of available land for housing, the lack of financial resources, lack of coordination between infrastructure planning and housing supply, and skills shortage in the housing and construction sectors.
“The impact of the housing shortfall is real….the number of people experiencing housing stress is increasing,” the minister said.
Solving this critical situation represents a big challenge to the government, given the high cost of construction material and related expenses, but one that the government was committed to investing in since housing, besides being a very basic requirement, also holds the key to accelerating the pace of development in Guyana, Jordan stated.