FIABCI seeks private sector partnership on moderately-priced housing
The International Real Estate Federation (FIABCI) has launched a campaign on moderately-priced or affordable housing and, to realize this dream, it is seeking private sector interests to partner with in order to proffer solution to the problems associated with the delivery of such houses.
The federation which is a global network of real estate professionals notes that, up to now, affordable housing initiatives have been mainly undertaken by governments and urban authorities through subsidies, tax incentives, re-zoning and allocation of extra air-rights, disclosing that its objective is to get the private sector involved with the hope that, if they are successful in this endeavor, it should be possible to significantly expand activities and projects in this field.
FIABCI Nigeria is highly involved in this campaign having endorsed the federation’s slogan—‘The City We Need is Affordable’—and also being among a distinguished panel at the recently concluded MIPIM Conference where they discussed and shared experiences of urban policy and housing delivery.
On the panel, moderated by Danielle, FIABCI’s International President, was Emeka Eleh who represented FIABCI Nigeria. Other Discussants were Keiji Kamiyama of the Japanese Ministry of Land Infrastructure and Tourism, Brendan Reily, Vice Mayor City of Chicago and Farouk Mahmound, FIABCI India President.
In a statement in Lagos at the weekend, Gbenga Ismail, FIABCI Nigeria’s publicity, disclosed that the Nigerian chapter “is aggressively calling on private sector interest to partner with FIABCI as we collectively proffer solutions to the problem of affordable housing”.
FIABCI’s strident campaign is buoyed by its recognition that, in most markets around the world, there is a severe shortage of moderately priced housing and, according to UN reports, the world is undergoing a large wave of urban growth such that global population will increase to 2.5 billion people within the next 30 years and many of these people will become urban dwellers.
“The world’s shortage of housing will become more acute in the coming decades and the housing problem will become more concentrated locally because it is expected that, due to massive migrations to urban centers, over 75 percent of the world population will be living in cities mid-century”, the federation notes.
It believes that it is uniquely positioned to bring together all of the major global stakeholders in the real estate industry to propose solutions to meet the increasing demand for affordable housing within the world’s cities and to encourage the private sector to become involved by expanding activities and projects focused on affordable housing.
“Considering these perspectives, we decided to launch our 2016 World Urban Campaign in Dubai on January 10 of this year with the slogan ‘The City We Need is Affordable’, Grossenbacher said, adding, “we will focus on sharing best formulas and practices from around the world; we hope that it will contribute to increasing the supply of moderately-priced housing for rent and for sale for people working and living in cities”.
Continuing, he said, “our goal is to find various ways to reduce, as quickly as possible, the current imbalance between the low supply and huge demand for moderately-priced housing units”, revealing that through this campaign, FIABCI plans, among other measures, to identify beneficial financing formulas which will encourage investors and developers to embrace the campaign and to take an active role in planning the cities of tomorrow equipped with affordable housing – today.
CHUKA UROKO