HFH Mongolia Partners With Xac Bank To Help 300 Low-Income Families Build Or Renovate Homes
Local Commercial Bank Will Provide Microfinance Loans While Habitat Oversees Construction
ULAANBAATAR, 3rd April 2009: Habitat for Humanity Mongolia has inked a memorandum of understanding in the capital Ulaanbaatar with Xac Bank, a local commercial bank with microfinance facilities including housing loans for low-income families.
(From left) HFH Mongolia national director Charles Jolliffe, HFH Mongolia board president Dulmaa G and Xac Bank’s president and CEO, M. Bold.
The partnership between Habitat and Xac will help 300 low-income families to have solid and affordable housing in Ulaanbaatar, Darkhan, Erdenet and Arvaikheer. HFH Mongolia’s role is to work with the families in building or renovating their houses while Xac will provide financing and loan servicing.
The project is expected to commence in May 2009 with an official ceremony to mark the laying of the foundation stone on the first house.
Meanwhile, HFH Mongolia continues to expand its partnerships with various organizations. Together with Vision Fund Mongolia, a microfinance institution granting loans for small businesses, Habitat helped 16 families to build new houses in 2008. The partnership is set to help 100 families in 2009. Vision Fund provides part of the funds and takes care of credit management and repayment while HFH Mongolia is responsible for construction management.
Training of HFH Mongolia’s staff by GTZ, the German state development agency, helped to promote awareness of environmentally friendly and energy-saving technologies.
HFH Mongolia is also discussing water and sanitation initiatives in Ulaanbaatar with Action Contre la Faim, a humanitarian organization founded in France.
In addition, HFH Mongolia will facilitate an initiative to connect leaders of today with leaders of tomorrow. In July, Habitat plans to bring together mayors, non-governmental organizational partners and Xac Bank officials to meet final year architecture and development studies students for a consultation on housing low income families in Mongolia. This will be followed by a design competition and debate in August among the participating students. The winner of the competition will have the opportunity to attend Habitat for Humanity’s second Asia-Pacific Housing Forum to be held in Manila in September.