The government is giving full attention on the development of housing and construction industry to provide better residential facilities to people, said Caretaker Federal Minister for Housing and Works, Nasir Muhammd Khan on Thursday.
Presiding over a high level meeting of the Housing Advisory Board (HAB) here at Civil Secretariat, the minister said that due to the government's progressive investment and economic friendly polices, the housing sector and construction industry had made unprecedented growth in last couple of year under the dynamic leadership of President General Pervez Musharraf.
The minister said that poverty ratio has been reduced manifolds and standard of living of people especially of the poor strata has been improved considerably. "Roads are ways to civilisation," he said, adding now the distance between house and work place are now measure with time instead of kilometers. He said that construction of Islamabad Peshawar-Motorway (M-1) has opened up the whole region especially NWFP for investment and economic activities.
On a point raised by NWFP Secretary for Housing of high prices of land in Peshawar for launching a new housing colony, the minister opined that the Charsadda district is now ideally placed for investment and construction of housing units because the distance between Peshawar and Charsadda has considerably been reduced as result of motorway.
The government, he said, is striving hard to promote construction industry in the country, adding the private sector role in housing development would be encouraged. The minister directed the officials concerned of making sure of setting a deadline for a project to avoid lapse of time and money. The meeting stressed the need of sensitising media about building codes to avoid the tragic incidents of mishaps and earthquake havoc's such as October 8, 2005.
The major reasons of the October 8, 2005 earthquake devastation in which more than 74,000 people lost their lives and hundreds of thousands were injured besides millions were homeless in that natural catastrophe was due to unplanned construction without building codes.
NWFP Secretary Housing, Jamil Amjad on the minister's emphasis ensured that an awareness seminar would be held to sensitise media about building of codes. The meeting underscored the need of constructing housing projects through Pakistan Engineering Council (PEC) and government approved contractors to avoid mishaps.
The meeting was attended by Federal Secretary for Housing and Works, Rauf Chaudhry, NWFP Secretary Housing, Jamil Amjad, Director General National Housing Authority (NHA), Talat Miyan, DG NWFP Housing Authority, Member Planning Commission Capital Development Authority (CDA), Brigadier Nasratullah and other high ranks officials from Sindh, Balochistan and Punjab provinces.