Ever since China opened up to the world in 1980's, the Shanghai Municipal Government, led by the Communist Party of China and the State Council, makes great effort to build the city into an international economic, financial, trade and shipping center. With the cooperation and hardwork of Shanghai people, the city is progressing to its goal as a global metropolitan. The new team of leaders of the Shanghai government took office in February 2003. "The power of the government is entrusted by the people; the interest of people is above all," as Shanghai Mayor Han Zheng promise in his inaugural. Guided by the Shanghai Party Committee, the city's new leadership vows to strictly perform its official duties; to make significant progress in self-improvement, and to intensify the shift of its role from administrative to public service. The Shanghai government will build itself into a service government that would share with the people all their happiness and troubles; a solid responsible government that is efficient, honest and diligent; a law-abiding government that respects legal system and rules strictly and impartially.

Scale of supply and construction of supporting commercial housing in Shanghai will be enlarged

07/07/2004

Scale of supply and construction of supporting commercial housing in Shanghai will be largely enlarged. News came from the municipal housing land resources bureau on March 29th that supporting commercial housing with an area of 3 million square meters will be delivered for use within the year, and it is planned that another 3 million square meters will be started construction this year. Out of the construction projects, three bases for "four highs" modeling residential districts for the first group of low and medium price housing have entered project public bidding phase.

Since 2002, Shanghai has launched construction of the first commercial housing supporting key projects which cover an area of 1 million square meters to meet the living need of relocated residents. The first commercial housing supporting key projects which have been constructed in accordance with the principle of "low cost but high standard, small area but complete function and beautiful environment" has been delivered for use in succession since last year. According to statistics, area of commercial housing supporting key projects completed construction amounted to 1.019 million square meters last year, and the 140,000 suites of housing sources have been supplied to residents relocated for the construction of such key projects as rail transportation, urban green belts and mid-ring road, etc. Currently, supporting commercial housing under construction covers an area of 3.45 million square meters, out of which 610,000 square meters have been completed construction at the first two months. The housing sources will be supplied to relocated bases for key projects of Shanghai and part of them will be provided to relocated bases for key projects on district level by corresponding districts.

Although prices of supporting commercial housing are in low and medium level, they must be "planned with high level, designed with high standard, constructed with high quality and managed with high standard". In order to further explore construction mechanism for supporting commercial housing, Shanghai also practices trial spot construction for "four highs" residential districts with low and medium prices. Last year, Shanghai began to do trial spots in three land pieces at Baoshan, Jiading and Nanhui Districts, and the other three pieces launched this year are located respectively at Jiangqiao Town in Jiading District, Kangqiao Town and Zhoupu Town at Nanhui District, covering a total space of 1.6 million square meters. Person in charge of Shanghai Residence Construction Development Center said that focus is to be put on planning in large land pieces in pressing ahead supporting commercial housing construction so as to be helpful for improvement of housing quality and in-step of supporting facilities. The three "four highs" modeling residential districts with low and medium prices under public bidding cover an area of 1-1.6 square kilometers, and can accommodate around 40,000 persons, whose planning scenario has been chosen out of public bidding done worldwide. It is reported that over 20 developers offer to undertake the project.

Supporting commercial housing are mainly to meet the need of living for disadvantaged families at relocated bases. It is revealed that relevant departments have regulated that the supporting commercial housing must not be transferred within 5 years; next, measures are to be produced to ensure disadvantaged families can have priority to benefit the project. House structure of supporting commercial housing is compact-oriented and with a proportion of different sizes as the following: the one covering 50 square meters (with one bed room and living room)makes up 15%, the one covering 70 square meters (with two bed rooms and one living room) makes up 60% and the one covering 90% square meters (with three bed rooms and one living room) makes up 25%. In the future, efforts are to be made to try changeable house structure, for instance, bed room and living room can be designed as two comparatively unattached space, which can serve as the one with two bed rooms and one living room; to design the one with one bed room and a living room and the one with two bed rooms and one living room into that which can be divided into two suites or combined into one suite with three bed rooms plus one living room and one dinning room, so as to meet the need of a families with three generations living under the same roof.

It is predicted that with large amount of low and medium price housing coming into market, increase rate in average housing prices of Shanghai will tend to be moderated to some extent.

The Shanghai government 2006