Spanish company keen to invest in housing sector
By Fakhar Alam

ISLAMABAD—A Spanish company ‘Barcons’ is keen to invest in housing sector in Pakistan to address acute shortage of housing units in the country.
This was stated by head of a 10-member delegation which calledon Federal Minister for Housing and Works Nisar Mohammad Khan at his office here. Minister for Housing and Works informed the Spanish delegationthat owing to increasing demand of housing units, there exist tremendous opportunities for investment in real estate and housing sector.
He said that a United Arab Emirates based company will alsoinvest dollar 1.2 billion in housing sector in Pakistan.
“Demand of houses would reach 500,000 within next twenty years, adding that housing backlog stood at 4.30 million in 1998 which, according to current projections, stands at 6.19 million,” he said. The Minister told the delegation that 350,000 housing units were established in year 2006 with an investment of Rs. 150 billion plus cost of land for the construction. Head of the Spanish delegation, David Crawford said that Barcons is one of the leading companies of Spain working in construction, automobile and industrial sectors.
He said that the company having modern machinery, architects,designers and skilled labour force can construct 8,000 housing units of high standard in just three year. He said that they would construct environment-friendly, modern and viable housing units at a very reasonable price of Rs. 1800 per square feet. Members of the delegation showed keen interest to capture the vast market in housing sector in Pakistan.
Minister for Housing and Works said that Prime Minister Mohammadmian Soomro has directed the Ministry of Housing and Works to come up with such policy measures which are pragmatic and implementable and construct low cost housing scheme for low income federal government employees.
Pakistan Housing Authority (PHA) has launched a scheme to construct 36,000 flats for low-paid federal government employees in the federal capital and all provincial headquarters, Nisar Khan said.
Consultant Pakistan Housing Authority, Samiul Haq Khiljee told the delegation that under a pilot project 1,000 flats have already been constructed in Sector G-11 in Islamabad while another 1,000 would be built there for which the CDA has been asked to purchase land. Federal Secretary Ministry of Housing and Works Abdul RaufChaudhry, DG NHA, Tallat Mian, DG PHA, Shahid Hamid and high officials of the ministry were also present on the occasion.