Bahrain will spend around BD3 billion ($7.91 billion) on government homes and projects by 2017, according to Housing Minister Basem Al Hamer.

Despite reoccurring challenges in the sector, 100,000 houses had been built and loans worth BD3 billion were awarded to people in the last 50 years, he was quoted as telling MPs by our the Gulf Daily News, our sister publication.

"The government has built two major towns, Hamad and Isa, since 1973 but due to a population influx, we had to come up with more and for that four new towns were planned - Northern, Southern, Southern Hidd and Northern Sitra," said Al Hamer.

"Work is undergoing to build the four and provide people with their housing needs and we have more planned in future with Bahrain's area increasing to 851 sq km.

"We want more homes built and there are currently two approaches - regular homes with our standard being 32 houses per hectare or 70 apartments per hectare."

Al Hamer was responding to a question by MP Ali Al Durazi on the number of homes being built by the ministry and future projects to meet rising the population.

Meanwhile, Al Hamer said 90 per cent of Bahraini families were benefiting from the ministry's housing services and new changes would increase that.

He revealed several projects were also being carried in the Capital Governorate to meet demand.

"We have two major housing projects in Burhama and Billad Al Qadeem, which will also benefit residents of business clustered areas like Adliya, Segaiya and Mahooz," said the minister. – TradeArabia News Service