HÀ NỘI – Việt Nam currently has an average floor area per person of 22.8sq.m, according to a recent report by the Ministry of Construction.

The figure, calculated up to the end of December last year, shows a year-on-year increase of 0.8sq.m. and surpasses the ministry’s 2016 housing target of 22.6sq.m per person.

Compared with 2009, each Vietnamese person on average enjoys an additional 6.1sq.m. of floor area, which equals to an increase of 0.96sq.m per person per year.

According to Deputy Minister of Construction Đỗ Đức Duy, thanks to the ministry’s programme to build low-cost housing across the country in the past years, hundred thousands of poor and low-income households got the opportunity to improve the quality of their accommodation.

In 2016, a further 0.5 million sq.m of low-cost housing was added in the urban areas, increasing the total area of low-cost housing in urban areas to 3.3 million sq.m.

According to Lê Hoàng Châu, Chairman of the HCM City Real Estate Association, the growth is an upbeat sign for the sector and for the development of the country.

However, he said it is important to pay attention to devise appropriate policies to develop housing areas equally among different regions as large gaps still persist between urban and rural areas, poor and rich people and among provinces. – VNS