The number of residential houses in Ethiopia will be doubled in the coming 10 years.
Ministry of Urban Development and Construction (MoUDC) has revised the 16 years old housing policy and strategy to give more options for private sector involvement on the housing scheme.
The amended strategy for affordable housing schemes that has been sent to the Council of Minister for ratification has expanded the alternatives to 12.
MesfinAssefa, State Minister for urban development and housing at MoUDC, said that the coming of real estate proclamation that has currently been sent to the Council of Ministers is said take into the account of the revised housing strategy.
He said as per the new strategy that revises the 2005 document, the public with the private sector will be involved on housing scheme to expand for affordable housing. He added that as per MoUDC evaluation the interest of the private sector to engage on the housing scheme that is mainly dominate by the government in partnership with dwellers is very high.
“The government share on providing housing under the existing experience will be shrank and transfer for the direct involvement of the public and the private sector with different new technologies will embark,” he explained.
“Housing problems shall be significantly resolved when the strategy gets a green light by the top leadership and finalized to become effective,” he told Capital.
The strategy has added more alternatives from the previous eight housing scheme. “The drafted strategy has put 12 housing alternatives and mainly focuses on the private sector involvement in different arrangements,” Mesfin says, adding, “amending the strategy is crucial since the government could not continue as a major actor on the sector due to that mostly public private partnership (PPP) modalities, joint venture, real estate development, cooperatives and mixed use are the alternatives that is expected to magnify the involvement of the private sector and the general public in the sector development.”
Pre feasibility and feasibility study on six sites have already been conducted for PPP modalities in collaboration with Federal Housing Corporation.
For the real estate development and marketing proclamation the ministry have taken several years and discussed in detail with the public and relevant offices.
The strategy has also been assessing the source of fund. According to MoUDC as per the study conducted in this budget year there is one million residential house demands in the capital and which will be 4.4 million in the coming ten years across the country.
The government has targeted to attain at least 80 percent in this decade from the current about 60 percent.
Mesfin explained as per the projection every year 471,000 houses is supposed to be constructed including rural areas and in the coming 5 years, 486,000 every year in the second five year period, “the construction will be carried out by all partners including individual residents, developers or the government.”
In the coming ten year MoUDC targets to see the construction of 4.4 million houses in all over the country that will double the exit figure.
Ethiopia is the second most populous and the fifth least urbanized country in Africa. At present, 21 percent of Ethiopia’s of 112million residents live in urban areas (23.5 million people), according to the national definition, its significantly below the Sub Saharan average of 40.4 percent. There are over 950 towns and cities in the country.
According to figures from MoUDC, currently, in the country there are over four million houses in the country, but 30 percent are sub standard and 74 percent of them should need crucial renovation.
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