At the newspapers editors committee today, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said in response to a question by "Globes" editor Haggai Golan about the government's measures to restrain the housing market, that the government would formulate addition measures to cool home prices.
"We're a small country that has insisted historically on making itself smaller," said Netanyahu. "Until a year ago, more than 90% of the country's land was held by the Israel Land Administration. We have high population density and, we must also increase the supply of land in both the long term and the short term.
"The second thing is to bring traffic arteries to the Negev and Galilee. Yesterday, I flew to see the western border fence. You fly over vast empty spaces - that's our reserves. People reside between Hadera and Gedera. We want to develop the railways to link Tel Aviv with Ashdod and Eilat. Immense work is also underway on roads: we must create transport access for the Galilee and the Negev. We'll invest NIS 30 billion in this over the next decade.
"The third thing, which has not yet been fully implemented, is the reform of the planning and building commissions. There is available land, but you can't reach it or market it. This is a necessary component for pulling us out of the historic distress, and it's the real solution to the country's home prices.
"In the short term, we announced three measures, and we'll soon announce more measures from time to time. Every few weeks, we'll announce measures to find short-term solutions. We'll either halt or slow the rise in home prices. I also cancelled the ban by the previous government on building in the center of the country. We're changing the face of the country with the transport plan, and we're emerging from the narrow Hadera-Gedera corridor. That's great news."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on November 29, 2010
© Copyright of Globes Publisher Itonut (1983) Ltd. 2010