Source: Agência Envolverde - SP - 13/08/2009

Brazil has a housing deficit of around 7 million homes. Despite the scarce budget, what prevents the reduction of this number is the bureaucracy. The federal, state and municipal governments, even with the existence of projects, are unable to expedite the release of available resources.

The country uses four funds - Time of Service Guarantee Fund (FGTS), National Social Interest Housing Fund (FNHIS), Residential Lease Fund (FAR) and the Social Development Fund (FDS) - to finance housing for low-income people. President Lula also launched the “Minha Casa, Minha Gente” program, which intends to build up to one million houses with government subsidies, which will vary according to income.

Despite this, FNHIS and FAR ended 2008 without releasing much of what was foreseen for the budget and the situation is likely to repeat itself this year. The FNHIS budget for 2007 and 2008, for example, was R $ 1,952 billion, but only R $ 405,477 million was contracted. In the Residential Rental Program (PAR), financed by the FAR, of the budget of R $ 1 billion foreseen for this year, only R $ 300 million were released.

According to the national housing secretary at the Ministry of Cities, Inês Magalhães, the PAR will have to be reformulated to work better. It is likely that part of its resources will go to “Minha Casa, Minha Vida”. For the president of the Brazilian Chamber of the Construction Industry (CBIC), Paulo Safady Simão, the great merit of “Minha Casa” is from the private sector and the entire functioning of programs such as FNHIS are hampered by government bureaucracy.

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