Housing reviewed in Ghana.

WHEN MR KWAMINA Bartels, Ghana's Minister for Works and Housing, opened the housing conference in Accra on 15 September Ghana was already hosting the 22nd Africa Union Housing Finance Conference (AUHF) ending on the 21st. The housing finance meeting was scheduled to be attended by 17 other countries including Nigeria, Uganda, Kenya, South Africa, Malawi, Tanzania, Egypt, Swaziland and others. Delegates discussed the challenges facing the provision of housing on the continent and how to affordably build capacity to solve them.

As part of its core objective, the group shared experiences from member countries on housing as it believes that housing is country-centred, the group intends to build capacities of the member countries to enable them find specific solutions to the housing needs of the various countries.

The housing conference under the theme "The future of sustainable housing finance system towards affordable housing and infrastructure", deliberated on ideas to formulate strategies for innovative housing finance products for the member countries of the Union's pilot projects. This would enable them to identify and discover various challenges and potentials for micro-scale housing finance to support upgrading activities including affordable housing and infrastructure.

The Accra Housing Conference also focused on the informal settlement challenges in Africa, highlighting issues such as urban poverty alleviation, housing and infrastructure provision for low-income groups.

According to Mr Samson Moraba, the chairman of AUHF, the group was formed in response to the housing challenges confronting Africa and the need to provide affordable shelter for the low-bracket income earners.

AUHF is not a housing financing entity, rather it depended on support from multinational financial organisations such as the World Bank to leverage contributions made by member countries to support housing projects. The World Bank recently gave out US$300,000 to support innovative pilot housing currently being put up in Ghana, Tanzania and Swaziland.