Uganda, like many other countries, is challenged with a shortage of decent housing for its fast-growing population.
Many people work their entire life but fail to put up a desirable house, and as a result, the biggest size of the population continues to live in substandard units.
In a discussion held over the weekend at the CASTLE think tank, many experts in the housing sector showed that although most of Uganda’s population is young, they can barely afford the housing sector.
They also highlighted that the housing sector remains expensive because we are dependent on materials from abroad. We haven’t become innovative enough to invest into research to build the sector and make it more affordable.
Architect Patricia Khayongo Rubita, the Managing Director of Dream Africa, notes that one of the factors impeding the growth of the housing sector is the high cost of construction materials.
However, she is convinced that this can be addressed quickly by looking at the available local materials and how they can be applied. For that to happen there needs to be investment in the sector to also provide incentives for local innovators to come up with possible solutions on how to construction materials more affordable.
Architects from the think tank are therefore, rooting for a Housing Development Fund and standardization of local construction materials to solve the biggest challenge of the sector which is the cost of housing.
