Workshop on Consultation and Technical Assistance to National Housing Development Strategy toward 2020, vision of 2030

Housing is not only a valuable asset for each family or an individual but also an indicator for the development of a nation’s socio-economy and an expression of culture, customs and tradition of each ethnic group in different areas. In a society, improving housing is an urgent task in order to raise the people’s living standards. It is a fundamental right for a person to have a safe and adequate accommodation. It is also a legitimate need for a household and a necessary condition for developing human resources as needed by the industrialization and modernization process in Vietnam.

The policies in housing area issued by the State in recent years have produced positive results. The assessment can be looked at the aspects such as: Increase in number of houses and urban areas, Increase in housing area, Growth in housing quality and size.

Besides several achievements as mentioned above, the implementation of housing development policy is riddled with problems and inadequacies that need to be resolved in order to accelerate housing development, improve house supply and assist those people in difficulties to improve their living conditions. Such problems and inadequacies are housing development policy and mechanism, Lack of synchronization between housing policies and land, investment, planning and financial policies, Houses price increase makes a negative impact on people’s accomodation affordability, Ever-increase in imbalances in the ratio of different house types and gaps in living conditions, Lack of synchronization in housing investment policies in rural areas, The model of organising and developing houses fails the requirement of the process of national industrialisation and modernisation, Housing finance system lack synchronisation, Cumbersome and complicated administrative procedures in the housing fields, Problems on direction in the implementation of certain housing programs and policies, The inadequacies in structure of the state management mechanism on housing, The investigation, inspection and treatment to the violations of the housing laws have not been conducted regularly and thoroughly.

Aware of challenges and opportunities in developing housing, Ministry of Construction has co-operated with related departments to develop “National Housing Development Strategy toward 2020, vision of 2030”, to summit the Prime Minister. The Ministry of Construction has requested UN-HABITAT’s technical support in the improvement of the national housing policy and the development of a strategy for low income housing. It is also recognized that a study to gain deep understanding of the housing sector would be necessary to identify areas that have been overlooked or insufficiently addressed in current housing policy of Vietnam. In addition, capacity building for policy makers at both central and local level is essential for improvement in the housing sector.

In the workshop on “National Housing Development Strategy toward 2020, vision of 2030” organized on 8 March 2011 in Hanoi, housing experts from UN-HABITAT presented experiences of developing national housing policy, especially in Asian Pacific, provided “Quick Guide for policy makers on Housing the poor in Asian cities” to the Ministry of Construction and Central Steering Committee for Housing and Real Estate Market Policy to share international experiences on developing and implementing low income housing policy with participation of related partners. In addition, UN-HABITAT’s consulting group also presented introduction of Vietnam Housing Profile with five topic such as: (1) Policy and institutional frameworks, (2) Housing finance and markets, (3) Infrastructure/basic urban services, (4) Land supply systems, and (5) Construction industry and building materials. Participants also discussed and commented on the draft of National Housing Development Strategy. Hopefully after this workshop, “National Housing Development Strategy toward 2020, vision of 2030” will be more complete, to make it become legal basis for the State to issue suitable guidelines and policies to promote housing development, create conditions for all citizens, especially the poor, low-income earner to set up consistent and stable shelter.