The Ministry of Housing has taken significant steps toward finding comprehensive solutions to provide adequate housing for citizens, as it has coordinated its efforts with other relevant agencies, Among these steps is the signing of contracts to provide electricity service to some of its projects and to a number of grant schemes—totaling 29 schemes—in preparation for their development and inclusion among housing products.
It is hoped that this agreement will be followed by others that will continue the process initiated with the Electricity Authority by allocating 14 billion riyals to those plans, especially since statistics indicate the existence of approximately 3,700 plans encompassing about 2.5 million residential plots, At the same time, Housing Minister Majed Al-Hogail hopes to provide 1.5 million housing units to secure housing for the 1.3 million eligible individuals registered on the Ministry’s lists, with a surplus serving as a strategic reserve for the ministry.
The Housing Minister’s ambition to achieve his ministry’s goals is a legitimate and motivating force for success through steps that may seem somewhat slow but are more elegant, grounded in reality, and directly address the root causes of the problem that has long hindered urban development. The gradual remedy, according to the established plan, consists of three pillars currently being implemented by the Ministry: developing the infrastructure of allocated lands, which has begun with contracts with the Ministry of Electricity; the second pillar involves engaging the private sector and meeting with real estate developers to study their vision and incentive-based demands that would foster their partnership with the Ministry; The third and complementary pillar is the search for large tracts of land, particularly those that have long hindered urban development efforts. The esteemed Council of Ministers acted wisely when it passed the resolution to "impose fees on vacant land" to the Shura Council and formed a ministerial committee to study the implementation mechanism, chaired by the Minister of Housing, which means that the resolution will serve the interest of developing as much land as possible.
We hope that all relevant authorities in both the public and private sectors will work as a single team toward a noble goal that brings hope and smiles to the faces of more than 1.3 million families awaiting this good news, especially since new financing policies will soon be introduced, which will serve as a catalyst for the development of more residential cities—not to mention residential units.
Editor-in-Chief
