THE government has finally launched the national housing policy in collaboration with UN Habitat, marking the first update in 25 years. The delay is hard to defend. The housing deficit is estimated at around 13m units and growing. The population keeps rising, cities keep filling up, and socio-economic pressures are splitting families into smaller households. Land and construction cost more every year. Mortgage finance is negligible. Planning is absent or weak. Families shut out of the formal market end up in informal settlements and unapproved housing schemes. The new policy promises affordable housing, easier finance, secure land tenure and the upgrading of informal settlements. These are welcome objectives. Delivery will be the problem. Take the Apna Ghar programme. By Sept 4, banks had approved Rs351.3bn in financing, but only Rs51.13bn had been released. The programme is young, and disbursement may speed up. The country has no shortage of policy papers. It lacks institutions that answer for results, and a clear division of responsibility between the federation, the provinces and development authorities.

Housing cannot be treated as a matter of bricks and mortgages alone. Subsidised loans help individual households, but they do nothing for the shortage of affordable land. Cheap credit does not raise incomes or bring down the price of cement and steel. The state must make serviced plots available, extend transport and utilities, enforce zoning laws and allow denser, vertical building. For years private societies have spread over farmland while cities went unplanned and the urban poor were pushed to the margins. The result is sprawl, long commutes and lost cropland. The cabinet has reportedly asked for strict compliance with zoning laws and more vertical construction. That direction should be turned into rules, with penalties for breaking them. The policy should be judged by how many low- and middle-income families actually get homes, not by the value of loans approved or disbursed. Every target needs a deadline and regular progress reports. The housing ministry and the State Bank already review Apna Ghar weekly. The same discipline should extend to the new policy. Land and building rules are provincial subjects, so the provinces must agree to the targets. Without that, the 13m figure will keep climbing.

Published in Dawn, October 7th, 2026