Private Sector Participation, Structural Adustment and Nigeria's New National Housing Policy: Lessons from Foreign Experience

This paper provides an overview of the new National Housing Policy (NHP) adopted in Nigeria in 1992. The language of the new policy approach promotes the private sector as the chief means to address the severe shortages and high costs of shelter. However, it appears that many of the key measures advocated in the NHP could be counteractive to both private sector development and the Structural Adjustment Programme. Indeed, the financial inst ruments proposed may well increase the role of the public sector, and expand the distortions that have undermined the functioning of the housing market. Through a review of similar strategies and programmes that other countries have used to rejuvenate their shelter sector, the paper provides information on how the NHP might be revised to better exploit the private sector, operate more efficiently and sustainably, and contribute to, rather than impede the Structural Adjustment Programme.