Land, Housing A Top Priority

(To watch the 2020-21 Budget speech with sign language interpretation, click here.)

Financial Secretary Paul Chan today underlined the Government's continuing commitment to resolving Hong Kong's land and housing challenges, noting that various new development area projects would add more than 210,000 housing units in the medium to long term.

In his Budget speech, Mr Chan said the 2020-21 Land Sale Programme will feature 15 residential sites providing about 7,500 units.

Together with railway property development projects and private development and redevelopment projects, the potential land supply for the whole year is expected to provide about 15,700 units.

The programme will also include six commercial sites estimated to offer about 830,000 sq m of floor area.

Mr Chan noted the latest land forecast, scheduled to be announced in the second quarter of this year, will provide a blueprint of land search and creation for the Government.

On housing supply, the finance chief said 135 sites had been rezoned for housing, providing more than 147,000 public housing units and about 44,000 private housing units over the past six years.

Another dozen sites are now being rezoned and will add 11,000 housing units, more than 90% of which will be public housing. Another 25 sites will be rezoned in the coming year to yield nearly 85,000 units, over 90% of which will be public housing.

Mr Chan added that total public housing production in the five-year period from 2019-20 to 2023-24 is expected to provide about 100,400 units, comprising about 74,400 public rental housing and Green Form Subsidised Home Ownership Scheme flats, and about 26,000 subsidised sale units.

He also estimated that the private sector will, on average, complete about 19,600 private residential units annually from this year to 2024 - an increase of about 25% over the annual average of the past five years.

Mr Chan added that the three-year Land Sharing Pilot Scheme will start receiving applications in the first half of this year. The area of land to be approved will be capped at 150 hectares, which he believes can supplement the supply of public and private housing in the short to medium term.