Housing and Urban Planning Minister, Amna bint Ahmed Al-Rimaihi, has participated in a special session on achieving universal access to adequate housing through inclusive and stronger multilateralism.
Officials and specialists from the UK, France, Canada, Mexico, The Philippines and Kenya also participated in the panel session, held on the sidelines of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme Assembly (UNHA 2), held here on June 5-9.
The dialogue session focused on the importance of decent housing in achieving social and economic development. The participants called for devising comprehensive long-term policies to ensure the provisions of affordable social housing for the citizens.
Addressing the session, Minister Al-Rumaihi affirmed Bahrain’s early awareness of the potential challenges associated with the increase in demand for housing services as a result of the high rates of population, which requires intensifying efforts to provide housing services to low-income citizens .
As a result, she said, the government had begun providing housing cities since the 1960s, starting with Isa Town, and then Hamad Town and Zayed City, in addition to the current five housing cities, namely Salman, Khalifa, East Hidd and East Sitra towns, as well as Al-Ramli District.
She stressed that the kingdom has been keen to implement housing projects, alongside sufficient community services and facilities in order to provide decent housing for the citizens.
The minister added that the government not only provided housing citizens, but also launched partnership initiatives with the private sector, to carter to the citizens’ housing needs and provide them at affordable costs.
Al-Rumaihi indicated thanks to its successful policies, the kingdom had managed to implement HM the King’s order to provide 40,000 housing services between 2013 and 2022, which is a record number of services to be provided in such a short period of time.
Concerning the ongoing efforts to provide housing for the citizens, she said the housing financing scheme and the government lands development programme, implemented in partnership with the private sector, aim to provide thousands of affordable housing services, adding that the programmes pave the way for the citizens to receive instant housing services at the location of their choice, which meets the needs of Bahraini families.
Al-Rumaihi affirmed the Kingdom’s constant keenness to ensure that various social segments have access to affordable housing services, including women with children in their custody, divorcees, single women, widows, and minors, r people with special needs.
In this regard, she unveiled that the Housing and Urban Planning Ministry had provided housing services to more than 4,500 women, in addition to providing hundreds of housing units that serve people with special needs.
Source: Bahrain News Agency