ISLAMABAD, May 8: The Earthquake Reconstruction and Rehabilitation Authority (Erra) has said it will keep a check on the prices of building materials in the quake- affected areas. The decision was taken at a meeting of the Erra board at the prime minister’s secretariat with Erra chief Altaf M. Salim in the chair. Members of the board including chief secretaries of NWFP and AJK attended the meeting.

The meeting decided not to allow black marketeers to exploit the situation and said necessary steps would be taken to check upward trend in the prices of building materials.

The board expressed satisfaction over the funding situation for various projects and the close collaboration of Erra with donors, sponsors and other stakeholders. The meeting also expressed satisfaction over the progress on various programmes being implemented by Erra in collaboration with the AJK and NWFP governments.

Reviewing the progress on rural housing, it was reported that 126 thousand houses had been surveyed out of some 600,000 houses planned to be surveyed.

It was decided that the disbursement of the second instalment of money for housing would be expedited so that the reconstruction work picked up pace.

The meeting was informed that the speed of work on training programme for master trainers was good and 570 master trainers had so far been trained to provide guidance for building seismically safe and earthquake resistant houses.

Updating the board about the education and health policies, it was reported that sufficient transitional structure for health and education had been provided till construction of permanent health and education facilities.

USAID and Asian Development Bank are active partners in construction of schools and significant progress has been made in construction of educational institutions under the sponsorship programme. Erra is working in close collaboration with sponsors and donors facilitating and allocating land to partners for reconstruction of educational facilities.

Representatives of AJK and NWFP expressed satisfaction over the reconstruction programme and made several suggestions to further streamline the process.