The Housing Ministry will be allocating some 6000 house lots and will work to see the completion of a highway into Parfaite Harmonie in 2014.
This apart, the ministry will be building more turnkey homes and developing new housing schemes including Silica City, thereby providing jobs for thousands of workers in the construction sector.
These projects were outlined by Housing Minister Irfaan Ali on Friday at an end-of-year press conference at his ministry’s office at Brickdam, Georgetown.
The ministry is targeting in 2014, the construction of 500 turnkey homes, Minister Ali said, as a lot of applicants now are requesting to be part of the project, the young professional homes, the clerical workers’ homes and the lower high income homes.
Trickledown effect
He pointed out that the acquisition of one of the homes as against constructing one works out far cheaper for the applicant. The minister also pointed to the ‘real trickledown effect’ the construction of the homes is having on the economies of the neighbouring communities where they are being constructed.
He said that in Eccles, to construct turnkey homes, the ministry in 2013 employed more than 400 persons from nearby communities, inclusive of Agricola and Mocha.
This housing development which is to be developed on the Linden-Soesdyke Highway would be one of the ministry’s signature projects as it would be a prime housing, commercial, tourism, and industrial development for Guyana, Minister Ali said.
The concept was launched at Building Expo 2013 and the ministry was hoping to have the conceptual designs, and outlay and outlook of the area available early in 2014.
The ministry has already publicly asked for anyone who wants to be part of the grand idea to submit their thoughts.
“Flooding, climate change, land availability, infrastructure upgrade, infrastructure expansion, future plans of a deep water port that will necessitate the expansion of our highway all the way to Linden, all of this makes Silica City a viable mid-town, mid-point area of development and opportunity for Guyanese people and we are going to pursue this dream, we are going to pursue this ambition with vigour because we at the Ministry of Housing believe strongly in the accomplishment of this dream,” he said.
Land allocation
The minister also pointed out that land allocation in Region Four has become an issue because of the lack of availability and has created challenges for the ministry’s planners.
“From a planning perspective it is becoming increasingly more difficult for us to find plots of land on the East Coast. Matter fact, we cannot locate lands on the East Coast now that can be used for housing development, because GuySuCo as you know is still the largest owner of land on the East Coast, and they are basically not ready to divest themselves of any portion of land in that area,” he said.
He said too, that the ministry is in its penultimate tier of development with regards to the East Bank.
Employment
The Housing Ministry will advertise very shortly for masons, carpenters, labourers and other skilled persons to work within the ministry.
This will be sustained employment for a period of a year or two that will see the workers being formed into small contracting groups and given the responsibility of constructing the different types of homes that are made available under the ministry’s housing programmes.
“We are going to train them to become contractors, to become owners of companies… they will be supervised by a competent team of engineers and planners here,” Minister Ali explained.
In 2014, the ministry is hoping to complete a few new schemes, among which are Zeeburg and the expansion of Zeelugt in Region Three, towards the creation of 1500 more lots.
There will also be the continued development of the East Bank corridor to bring about another 3000 lots. Focus will be placed on opening up of the Little Diamond area to have commercial and industrial development.
The ministry will also focus on completing the new highway into Parfaite Harmonie that would realise a new access road almost to the Demerara Harbour Bridge.
To be completed as well in 2014 is the asphaltic concrete paving of four collector roads between Eccles to Little Diamond. These are designed to create the link between the existing East Bank highway and proposed alignment that would link the East Coast and East Bank.
Minister Ali said that the ministry has already completed a preliminary design for the proposed link, and is hoping to complete the designs and start work soon. Continued focus will also be on some of the main arteries into Sophia.
