PESHAWAR, Jan 3: Federal Minister for Housing and Works Nasir Mohammad Khan has said the government is giving full attention to the development of the housing and construction industry in an effort to provide better residential facilities to people.

He said this while presiding over a meeting of the Housing Advisory Board at the Civil Secretariat here on Thursday.

The minister said due to the government’s investment and economic polices the housing sector and construction industry had registered unprecedented growth during the last couple of years.

The minister claimed that the poverty ratio had been reduced manifold and the standard of living of people, especially the poor ones, had improved considerably. He said the construction of the Islamabad Peshawar-Motorway (M-1) had opened up the whole region, especially the NWFP, for investment and economic activities.

On a point raised by the NWFP secretary for housing regarding high prices of land in Peshawar for launching a new housing colony, the minister said the Charsadda district was now ideally placed for investment and construction of housing units because the distance between Peshawar and Charsadda had considerably been reduced as a result of the highway.

He said the government was striving hard to promote the construction industry in the country, adding that the private sector’s role in housing development would be encouraged. The minister directed the officials concerned to set deadlines for every project in order to avoid lapse of time and money.

The meeting stressed the need for sensitising the media about building codes to avoid tragic incidents like the earthquake on October 8, 2005.

The major reason for the devastation caused by the earthquake was unplanned construction without building codes as a result of which more than 74,000 people lost their lives and millions became homeless.

NWFP Housing Secretary Jamil Amjad on the minister’s directives said that an awareness seminar would be held to sensitise the media about building codes. The meeting underscored the need for constructing housing projects through the Pakistan Engineering Council.—APP