AN ASSESSMENT OF LOW INCOME HOUSING PROGRAMME IN NIGERIA (A CASE STUDY OF STATE LOW INCOME HOUSING IN KWARA STATE)

CHAPTER ONE

GENERAL INTRODUCTION

 1.0      INTRODUCTION

            Housing is paramount human existence as it ranks among the top three needs of man. Its provision has always been of great necessity to man as a unit of the environment housing has profound influence on the health efficiency, social behaviour, satisfaction and general welfare of the community. It is a reflection of the cultural, social and economic values of society and one of the best historical evidences of the civilization of a country (Olotuah, 2000)

            The provision of adequate housing in any country is very vita as housing is a stimulant of the national economy. Housing is a set of durable assets, which accounts for a high proportion of country’s wealth and on which households spend a substantial part of their income. It is for these reasons that housing has become a regular feature in economic, social and political debates often with highly charged emotional contents (Agbola 1998).

           In Nigeria, like in many other developing nations of the world housing problem are multi dimension. The problem of population explosion continuous influx of people from the rural to the urban centre, and the lack of basic infrastructure required for good standard of living have compounded housing problem over the years. Access to this basic need by the poor whose constitute the large percentage of the world population has remained a mirage and it needs to be critically addressed. Ogieto (1987) has observed that the disparity between the price and quantity of housing on the one hand, and the number of household and the money available to them to pay these prices in the other, constitute the central problem of housing. The cost at which houses reach the market goes a long way to determine affordability, where the unit cost of houses is abnormally high only a few people are able to afford the houses. According to Okupe the Windapo (2000) the gap between income and shelter cost in Nigeria is very wide. This has almost eliminated the low-income earners from the housing market. A panacea to the problem is the contribution of co-operative societies and private developers to housing finance whose activities, particularly in tertiary institutions, this paper focuses in towards facilitating improved accessibility level to housing finance by low-income earners in Nigeria

1.1       STATEMENT OF PROBLEM

        It is accepted worldwide that in order of priority, only food takes precedence over shelter in man’s wants or needs. One of the most important things in our lives is where we live. Though low income housing had been prepared, our dream of housing for all in the year 200 had come and gone without any meaningful improvement in both the quality and quantity of our real estate.

         The problem of adequate and quantity housing remain unsolved and threaten civilization.

        Government has been largely responsible for the large scale of housing project whose greater proportion ends up in hand of high income have been done in many area from real estate development that make re-arrange the low income for benefit of people.

1.2       AIM AND OBJECTIVES AIM

The aim of this research work is to assess the low income housing programme in Nigeria.

OBJECTIVES

1. To determine the stages and condition of housing in the study area

2. To examine the problems associated with the management of housing in Kwara state

3. To suggest the way forward in making housing available for the populace.

4 To make suggestions on improvement in the quantity and quality of the various existing low cost housing scheme.

1.3       SCOPE OF THE STUDY

The study is basically designed to look into various effort undertaken by the state and Federal Government in the provision of houses for the people in form of low cost housing estate.

This study also takes a cursory look at the estate management/ development principle as practiced by the Kwara state government statutory bodies.