Gov’t to accelerate turn-key housing programme in 2023 – Minister Croal

Minister of Housing and Water, Collin Croal said the government will be accelerating its turn-key housing programme in 2023 in order to meet the growing demand for housing in Guyana.

“As part of our focus in 2023, more emphasis on home construction, not just about allocation, but construction…We want to in a fast-track way, to be able to encourage homeownership,” Minister Croal stated while speaking at an event in Sophia, Georgetown on Friday.

The PPP/C Administration when it got into office in August 2020 implemented a national housing programme aimed at providing affordable housing opportunities for Guyanese.

While the government has been rolling out its home construction programme countrywide, it implemented a number of other measures to encourage homeownership, with the latest being the steel and cement support for homebuilders.

Minister Croal said over 150 applicants went through the verification aspect of the programme and within two weeks, the ministry will commence issuing the vouchers for those persons to uplift their materials.

Additionally, under the Inter-American Development Bank’s (IDB) Adequate Housing and Urban Accessibility Programme (AHUAP), vulnerable groups are benefitting from home improvement subsidies up to $500,000 to carryout repairs on their properties.“When you look at what we are doing to encourage homeownership, homebuilding these are some of the interventions that we have,” Minister Croal pointed out.

Under the turn-key programme, in excess of 1,200 low, moderate and young professional units are underway in Regions, Three, Four, Six and Ten. Over 300 of the homes have been handed over to beneficiaries.

Additionally, through the AHUAP, a number of homes are being constructed targeting low income and vulnerable families.

The project to construct houses was conceptualised by His Excellency, Dr. Mohamed Irfaan, who had initiated the turn-key housing initiative when he served as housing minister prior to 2015.

In keeping with its manifesto, the PPP/C Government is committed to delivering 50,000 house lots to Guyanese within its first term in office. Over 19,000 house lots have been distributed thus far for 2022. (Extracted and modified from the Department of Public Information)