Policy Address

Create Developable Land to Build More Housing

Speed up Land Production and Development

101. The Government will continue to expedite land production to solve the longstanding land supply conundrum. We will:

0. streamline statutory and administrative procedures – Followed by the amendments to the relevant statutes, the Government will introduce more administrative measures to simplify procedures, for example, to complete straight-forward title-checking cases within 12 weeks to expedite disbursement of land resumption compensation; and to relax the gross floor area (GFA) exemption for aboveground carparks to speed up the development process;

1. extend the arrangement for standardisation of land premium³ – We will, within this year, regularise the "standard rates" arrangement for the redevelopment of industrial buildings and extend the applicable scope to cover industrial buildings for special uses completed before 1987. The Government will also introduce a pilot scheme to extend the arrangement in phases to agricultural land in the New Territories. The first phase targets at private developments within the existing new towns of Yuen Long, North and Tuen Mun districts, as well as those in the vicinity of railway stations; and

2. expedite the approval of building plans – Building Information Modelling (BIM) helps improve building design and speed up construction. The Government will promulgate this year a roadmap for full adoption of BIM in the preparation and approval of building plans for private development projects. We will ask the Hong Kong Housing Society, the Urban Renewal Authority (URA) and the MTRCL to act as pioneers from the second quarter of next year by adopting BIM in preparing building plans of residential projects.