ARGENTINA:
Plenty of Construction, Too Few Houses
Marcela Valente

BUENOS AIRES,  (IPS) - The construction industry is the star performer in Argentina's economic recovery after the deep financial crisis of 2001. But the building boom has not been able to correct the housing deficit that affects 25 percent of Argentine families.

In recent weeks, two events have occurred to draw attention to that deficit: poor families invaded land in a Buenos Aires "villa miseria" (slum settlement), and on Jul. 4, apartment buildings about to be handed over to their new occupants were looted.

Although political manoeuvres are suspected to be behind these events, the housing problem is far from being solved by the frenzy of construction, which has become the foremost category of investment here over the last year.

According to official figures, in May construction had grown by 24 percent compared with the same month in 2005, when the sector had already undergone considerable recovery. Over the same period, employment in the building trades rose by 30 percent.

Public and private money is invested in infrastructure and housing, but the homes being built are mainly for upper income families. Analysts say that Argentines' savings, even those formerly held abroad, are invested primarily in real estate.

Housing construction for families with the lowest incomes -- paid for by the national, provincial and municipal government -- is also growing nationwide, but not as fast as demand is.

"According to the 2001 census, the housing deficit in Argentina was 2,640,000 homes out of a total of more than 10 million families," Ana María Mereatur, executive secretary of the government's National Housing Council, told IPS.

This unmet demand reflects an increase of some 120,000 more households a year, added to the deficit accumulated in previous years. Within the total households in the deficit, 21 percent need a home, and 79 percent must improve or finish the homes they already have.

"For the first time in Argentina, buildings are going up at a fast pace. Historically, the rate never even reached 50,000 units a year, and we are building almost 120,000. In 2007 we will build 170,000," Mereatur said.

The needs are not evenly distributed throughout the country. In some provinces, like Formosa, located in the far north and one of the poorest, more than 60 percent of families suffer from a housing deficit. In Buenos Aires, the need falls to 8.5 percent, but they are more vocal about the problem.

In mid-June, some 100 families arrived by truck at the long established "Villa 31" at Retiro, an informal settlement in the city centre, home to some 12,500 people. The new arrivals set up camp.

"They went to fetch them and told them to come here, where they'd be close to the city centre, and they'd be given houses," said Norma Gutiérrez, a woman who has lived in Villa 31 since 1982 with her husband and four children, now fully grown.

Gutiérrez was referring to the new arrivals, many of whom are foreigners from bordering countries, especially Bolivia and Paraguay. "This affects those of us who have been waiting for a solution to our housing needs for decades," she protested.

"We know that the government is building houses, but they never said anything to us. We have been hoping for a solution every time there is a change in the authorities at the Housing Secretariat," she told IPS.

The second event took place in early July in the south of the capital, where most of the city's 16 slums are concentrated. The City Housing Institute built 250-unit apartment blocks in Bajo Flores, a neighbourhood there.

The four-storey buildings were on the point of being handed over to their new occupants from "Villa 1-11-14", the city's most populous slum with 22,000 people, half of whom are foreigners.

But some 500 homeless people -- including women and children -- arrived by truck in the early hours of Tuesday Jul. 4, tore down fences, broke doors and windows, and took stoves, heaters, door and window frames, everything, that is, that could be removed and carried away.

The looters fled, and the residents, who had hoped to move in this month, occupied the apartments to prevent further invasions by homeless families. The crisis was eventually overcome after the government intervened.

The authorities said that political opposition leaders must be covertly instigating these actions by homeless people.

However, they also admitted that the need exists, and the buildings that are going up are not enough to cope with the growing deficit. In Buenos Aires, 86,000 families are without a home, and 6,000 of them live in "Villa 1-11-14" in Bajo Flores.

At the same time, there are 127,000 unoccupied dwellings in the capital, according to information from the City Housing Institute (IVC). These homes are "luxury units" or "targeted at sectors with savings capability," who can buy them with mortgaged loans, the IVC said.

The greatest need for housing is found in society's lowest income bracket, whose savings capability is non-existent. "There is a vast ocean of need in this area," admitted Luis D'Elía, national under-secretary of Housing.