| Abstract: | Indonesia experienced rapid growth in the housing sector in the 1980s, accompanied by large-scale improvement of existing dwellings. There are clear signs of a large potential demand for more and better dwellings; though several bottlenecks exist which hamper this potential. This paper critically examines the credit-related bottleneck and the subsidised credit schemes designed to address it. Input-output analysis is used in the paper to study the structure of the construction materials sector. Examination shows that the adverse effects of a stimulation of housing demand on the balance of payments are small, and that employment in the construction materials sector is dominated by small-scale and household industry. Finally, an analysis of roofing materials shows that there is scope for further introduction of labour-intensive construction materials. |
