Venezuela to Accelerate Housing Mission

Venezuela will dramatically boost the development of public housing for the poor, the government announced Tuesday.

The country's housing mission will double the number of workers building new homes “immediately,” according to Housing Minister Manuel Quevedo.

“This will accelerate the works so that we can hit the milestone of 800,000 houses in the coming days, and reach one million (by the end of the decade),” he said.

Quevedo said the government of President Nicolas Maduro remains committed to prioritizing the housing mission, despite low oil prices that have sapped the administration of much of its budget.

Last week the minister said a total of more than 750,000 houses have been built under the mission so far.

In January the ministry put the number of completed housing units at just under 676,000, suggesting the government is building an average of more than 200 units each day.

“At this rate, 1 million people will be provided with homes by the end of 2015,” Quevedo said.

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One of the Venezuelan government's most popular social initiatives, the housing mission was first launched to provide shelter for people who lost their homes in devastating floods that hit the country in 2010. However, since then, the mission has expanded to provide low-cost housing to the wider population, with poor families receiving priority. Units are generally provided fully furnished. The houses are offered either for free or at a low cost, depending on the means of the prospective owners.

In 2011, then-President Hugo Chavez explained that the mission would address the “social debt” left behind by former governments that failed to provide quality housing to all Venezuelans.

The current Maduro administration has vowed to continue expanding the mission, aiming to provide low-cost housing to 40 percent of Venezuelans by the end of the decade.