China helps Venezuela in housing improvement: minister

As one of Venezuela's main financial and trade partners, China is actively helping the government realize its goal of meeting housing needs of low-income families.

In a recent exclusive interview with Xinhua, the minister of Housing, Habitat and Eco-socialism, Ricardo Molina, said 14,000 new homes have already been built in collaboration with China, and another 15,000 are under construction.

"This figure will increase as the relationship with China continues to expand over time," said Molina.

"President Nicolas Maduro has instructed us that this goes far beyond building homes; we must enter a new period of industrialization," he added.

According to Molina, this new period includes an initial phase, during which Venezuela plans to import construction materials and machinery from China, to spur housing development in the short term.

"We have been discussing to define what materials to purchase, their quality, prices, and transportation, which will help us make a significant leap in 2015," said Molina.

The next phase will include the installation of industrial plants in Venezuela, so it can build the construction materials it needs in the medium and long term, and at the same time boost its productive sector.

"We have a new kind of relationship, which includes attracting investment from major Chinese companies in association with our revolutionary government to build industries that can supply the domestic market and also export materials to nearby nations," said the minister.

In late 2010, and again in 2011 and 2012, flooding left more than 40,000 families across the country homeless.

In response to their plight, the Venezuelan government announced in 2011 the Great Housing Mission, an initiative spearheaded by then President Hugo Chavez.

The plan foresees 20 percent of production going to Latin American and Caribbean countries that require high quality and affordable construction materials from a nearby source.

"We must develop the capacity to produce 400,000 homes a year, (so) we' re focusing all our efforts on industrialization, and as a result we recognize China's interest in supporting the development of the industrial sector to reach these figures," said Molina.

"As part of these new projects, we already have opened a door and window factory that can produce these items for up to 180,000 homes a year," said Molina.

Under a 2-billion-U.S.-dollar agreement signed on Sept. 21 by Chinese and Venezuelan companies, the Chines side will supply two social housing projects so as to help build 3 million homes by 2019.