Lessons from Penang affordable housing

AS we all know, affordable housing is the saving grace for the middle to low income group in our common dream to pursue the “roof over our heads”.

Most often, aspiring homebuyers are sandwiched between increasing property price and developers’ tendency to build high-end apartments especially in greater KL for the last decade.

The introduction of PR1MA and other affordable housing agencies by the federal government is aimed at addressing this gap and to promote better home ownership as part of the prime minister’s national transformation programme. Nonetheless, not many realised that affordable housing is also a state initiative whereby state governments are free to introduce affordable housing schemes given that land and development are within the exclusive power of the state under the Federal Constitution. For instance, Penang is fully behind the notion of affordable housing by placing their top priority on increasing homeownership ratio within the state.

Checking online, there are currently 29 affordable housing projects in Penang with 12 being developed by the state government and the other 17 by the private sector. Penang is delivering a commendable amount of affordable housing by trading plot ratio of built-up area in exchange for more units to be built.

The state government is constantly reviewing and updating the criteria for the purchase of affordable housing in Penang. A person who already owns a property can still purchase affordable housing in Penang provided the person can satisfy the conditions imposed.

For example, the house to be purchased must be of higher value than the one already owned.

In addition, for those who are not born in Penang, under the talented and skilled category, they may also purchase affordable housing in Penang provided they undertake to reside there for a minimum of five years. In short, affordable has become a driver for talent retention. This ultimately helps to upgrade living standard in Penang.

On the flip side, Penang has uncovered a problem. Those who are entitled to affordable housing may not qualify for financing, especially those from the lower income group as they are considered as high risk by banks.

Job and income security at this level are extremely vulnerable given the high cost of living that in effect reduces disposal income. Bank and financial institution are after all profit-making entities. Loan disbursements below a certain threshold amount does not always generate their desire margin. Many expiring home owners are left helpless.

While nothing is perfect, one can only achieve success through lessons learned along the way and from history. The federal government is aware of the high loan rejection rate. It has, therefore, provided a 10% loan guarantee and First House Deposit Financing to help purchasers with their downpayments. The “Rent to Own” scheme was also introduced to circumvent the stricter loan financing situation.

Penang has introduced a similar Rent to Own scheme. Under this scheme, the state government provides 30% of the home price so that the house buyer can seek a 70% loan margin.

PR1MA, on the other hand, is facing difficulties finding suitable land as land is state matter. There is also a tendency for the state government to allocate land for this purpose in areas they want to urbanise, but which are often far from amenities and transportation links.

We all know that to develop affordable housing is not the best commercial decision to make because profit margins are definitely lower. As such, we cannot expect private sector developers to always bear the cost.

Penang, on the other hand, is able to overcome this problem by reducing the development charges via an increase in plot ratio. This then attracts private sector developers to come in.

A recent survey conducted by PR1MA shows that buyers prefer to purchase residential projects close to schools, clinics and shops. They also prefer access to transportation. Penang is closer to achieving its objective in the affordable housing arena because it “focuses on the homeowners”.

Under the recently announced Penang Transport Master Plan, the state government is mulling over RM8bil worth of projects that will enhance connectivity.

The development of an underground tunnel from Gurney Drive to Bagan Ajam, Gurney Drive to Jelutong Expressway and an alternative road connecting Gurney Drive right up to Batu Feringhi will really improve connectivity.

Penang is ambitious in executing its affordable housing plans. It is also spot-on when it comes to addressing the different issues connected with this subject.

The banking sector must buy into it. Banking and financial institutions are governed by the fiscal policy of the federal government. Maybe some mandatory quota or corporate social responsibility initiatives can be imposed on banks to provide loans to deserving house buyers. So it is timely that Bank Negara has called for a comprehensive and carefully designed National Planning Policy to support the Government’s aim in delivering more social housing in its recently released annual report.

By Chris Tan

Chris Tan is the founder and managing partner of Chur Associates.


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1MDB business model relied on debt to form capital is not sustainable

PETALING JAYA: 1MDB was unsustainable from the start, relying heavily on financial assistance to stay afloat.

The PAC observed that 1MDB’s capital financing structure and financial performance were both unsatisfactory.

“1MDB relied on debt (bank loans, bonds and sukuk) to form its capital, a chunk of which had been sanctioned or supported by the Government.

“Initially, the debt stood at RM5bil in 2009, and went up to RM42bil, compared to its assets of RM51bil in the financial year ending March 31, 2014, and it spent RM2.4bil to pay off interests.

“In January 2016, its debt was RM50bil, compared to its assets of RM53bil, where 1MDB spent RM3.3bil to pay off interests between April 1, 2013, and March 31, 2015,” said the report.

The PAC report also stated that 1MDB had paid RM3.3bil in interests on the loans it took from April 1, 2014, to March 31, 2015, which 1MDB said had yet to be audited.

“It is obvious that the debt amount and repayment of interest are too high compared to the company’s cash flow,” said the committee.

1MDB had also heavily relied on the refinancing exercise to settle matured debts and take new loans, which were used to settle interests on previous loans, among others.

The PAC report also found that 1MDB began facing an imbalance in cash flow in November 2014, five years after it started operations.

“The management and board of directors relied on the Initial Public Offerings (IPO) of Edra Energy Berhad to generate funds, but the IPO could not be carried out,” said PAC.

In the same month that year, 1MDB announced its first loss of RM665mil, resulting in its inability to pay off its almost matu­ring debts which stood at RM2bil, through its refinancing exercise.

“The company’s business model is overly dependent on loans and this caused a burden on the company as it did not have enough income to sustain operational costs and pay off its loans,” read the report.

The PAC also said that as a state investment arm, 1MDB should have focused on best practices, and raised examples of weaknesses in its administration.

“For instance, the board of directors was too dependent and often accepted explanations by the management without delving into the details.

“Indeed 1MDB’s experience is a lesson to all government-linked corporations on the importance of effective administration and integrity,” said the committee. - The Star/ANN

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Lighthouse in South China Sea is operating now

 

The lighthouse on Zhubi Reef in the South China Sea is now in use. XING GUANGLI / XINHUA

China turns on lighthouse on man-made island

China's Ministry of Transport on Tuesday held a completion ceremony for the construction of a lighthouse on Zhubi Reef, marking the start of its operation.

Beijing rebuffed suspicion on Wednesday over the operation of a lighthouse on an island in the South China Sea, saying it is a public service that China is providing to the region.

"China has been committed to providing more public products and services to navigation in the South China Sea. It is beneficial to the trade of coastal countries in the region and even some countries outside the region," Foreign Ministry spokesman Lu Kang told a regular news briefing.

The Ministry of Transport held a completion ceremony on Tuesday for construction of the lighthouse on Zhubi Reef, marking the start of the lighthouse's operation.

Construction of the 55-meter-high lighthouse, which has a lantern of 4.5 meters in diameter on top and rotating lights inside, began in October. The lighthouse is monitored via a remote control terminal.

The lighthouse emits white light in the nighttime, with a range of 22 nautical miles and a glow cycle of five seconds.

Zheng Heping, deputy head of the Maritime Safety Administration, said the automatic identification system and other equipment inside the lighthouse can provide efficient navigation services to ships, such as positioning reference, route guidance and navigation safety information.

To improve maritime emergency responses in the area, the Ministry of Transport started construction of large, multifunctional lighthouses on Huayang Reef, Chigua Reef and Zhubi Reef last year. The two other lighthouses are already in use.

"The Zhubi lighthouse will further enhance the capability to ensure maritime security in the South China Sea," Zheng said.

"The lighthouse is a very advanced one with multiple functions," said Zhang Xuegang, an expert on Southeast Asian studies at the China Institutes of Contemporary International Relations.

He said the lighthouse will provide information about hydrology and weather, including typhoon warnings, to passing vessels.

"It can also provide waterway information, such as which channels are busy," he added.

He suggested having rescue personnel live on the island.

Li Jinming, a professor of maritime policy and law at Xiamen University, said the lighthouses that China has built in the South China Sea are a testimony to its efforts to safeguard navigation freedom and security.

"The US, Japan and the Philippines have challenged China on that. And the glowing lighthouse is a silent answer."

Lighthouses are part of China's efforts to perform its responsibilities in maritime search and rescue, response to natural disasters and marine environmental protection, the Transport Ministry has said.

By Li Xiaokun China Daily/Xinhua

Oil Prices: What’s Behind the Drop? Simple Economics

 

    Some think it will be years before oil returns to $90 or $100 a barrel, a price that was pretty much the norm over the last decade. Credit Michael Stravato for The New York Times

The oil industry, with its history of booms and busts, is in its deepest downturn since the 1990s, if not earlier.

Earnings are down for companies that made record profits in recent years, leading them to decommission more than two-thirds of their rigs and sharply cut investment in exploration and production. Scores of companies have gone bankrupt and an estimated  250,000 oil workers have lost their jobs.

The cause is the plunging price of a barrel of oil, which has fallen more than 70 percent since June 2014.

Prices recovered a few times over the last year, but the cost of a barrel of oil has already sunk this year to levels not seen since 2003 as an oil glut has taken hold.

Also contributing to the glut was Iran’s return to the international oil market after sanctions were lifted against the country under an international agreement with major world powers to restrict its nuclear work that took effect in January.

Executives think it will be years before oil returns to $90 or $100 a barrel, a price that was pretty much the norm over the last decade.

What is the current price of oil?

Brent crude, the main international benchmark, was trading at around  $38 a barrel on Wednesday.

The American benchmark was at around $37 a barrel.

Why has the price of oil been dropping? Why now? 

This a complicated question, but it boils down to the simple economics of supply and demand.

United States domestic production has nearly doubled over the last several years, pushing out oil imports that need to find another home. Saudi, Nigerian and Algerian oil that once was sold in the United States is suddenly competing for Asian markets, and the producers are forced to drop prices. Canadian and Iraqi oil production and exports are rising year after year. Even the Russians, with all their economic problems, manage to keep pumping.

There are signs, however, that production is falling because of the drop in exploration investments. RBC Capital Markets has calculated projects capable of producing more than a half million barrels a day of oil were cancelled, delayed or shelved by OPEC countries alone last year, and this year promises more of the same.

But the drop in production is not happening fast enough, especially with output from deep waters off the Gulf of Mexico and Canada continuing to build as new projects come online.

On the demand side, the economies of Europe and developing countries are weak and vehicles are becoming more energy-efficient. So demand for fuel is lagging a bit.

Who benefits from the price drop?

Any motorist can tell you that gasoline prices have dropped. Diesel, heating oil and natural gas prices have also fallen sharply.ny motorist can tell you that gasoline prices have dropped. Diesel, heating oil and natural gas prices have also fallen sharply.

The latest drop in energy prices —  regular gas nationally now averages just above $2 a gallon, roughly down about 40 cents from the same time a year ago — is also disproportionately helping lower-income groups, because fuel costs eat up a larger share of their more limited earnings.

Households that use heating oil to warm their homes are also seeing savings.

Interactive Graphic: Why Oil Is Plummeting »

Who loses?

For starters, oil-producing countries and states. Venezuela, Nigeria, Ecuador, Brazil and Russia are just a few petrostates that are suffering economic and perhaps even political turbulence.

The impact of Western sanctions caused Iranian production to drop by about one million barrels a day in recent years and blocked Iran from importing the latest Western oil field technology and equipment. With sanctions now being lifted, the Iranian oil industry is expected to open the taps on production soon.
In the United States, there are now virtually no wells that are profitable to drill.

Chevron, Royal Dutch Shell and BP have all announced cuts to their payrolls to save cash, and they are in far better shape than many smaller independent oil and gas producers.

States like Alaska, North Dakota, Texas, Oklahoma and Louisiana are  facing economic challenges.

There has also been an uptick in traffic deaths as low gas prices have translated to increased road travel. And many young Saudis have seen cushy jobs vanish.

What happened to OPEC?

Iran, Venezuela, Ecuador and Algeria have all pressed OPEC, a cartel of oil producers, to cut production to firm up prices. At the same time, Iraq is actually pumping more, and Iran is expected to become a major exporter again.

Major producing countries will meet on April 17 in Qatar, and some analysts think a cut may be possible, especially if oil prices approach $30 a barrel again.

King Salman, who assumed power in Saudi Arabia in January 2015, may find it difficult to persuade other OPEC members to keep steady against the financial strains, even if Iran continues to increase production. The International Monetary Fund estimates that the revenues of Saudi Arabia and its Persian Gulf allies will slip by $300 billion this year.

Interactive Graphic How the U.S. and OPEC Have Controlled Prices »

Is there a conspiracy to bring the price of oil down?

There are a number of conspiracy theories floating around. Even some oil executives are quietly noting that the Saudis want to hurt Russia and Iran, and so does the United States — motivation enough for the two oil-producing nations to force down prices. Dropping oil prices in the 1980s did help bring down the Soviet Union, after all.

But there is no evidence to support the conspiracy theories, and Saudi Arabia and the United States rarely coordinate smoothly. And the Obama administration is hardly in a position to coordinate the drilling of hundreds of oil companies seeking profits and answering to their shareholders.

When are oil prices likely to recover? 

Not anytime soon. Oil production is not declining fast enough in the United States and other countries, though that could begin to change this year. But there are signs that supply and demand — and price — could recover some balance by the end of 2016.

Oil markets have bounced back more than 40 percent since hitting a low of $26.21 a barrel in New York in early February.

Some analysts, however, question how long the recovery can be sustained because the global oil market remains substantially oversupplied. In the United States, domestic stockpiles are at their highest level in more than 80 years, and are still growing.

But over the long term, demand for fuels is recovering in some countries, and that could help crude prices recover in the next year or two. - The New York Times

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Supersized and overweight civil servants

 

The public waiting their turn for services at a government department. - Filepic

When those two words describe a nation's public sector, it means it's truly a burden on taxpayers.

POOR civil servants! If you watched Disney’s animated film Zootopia, you would have caught the hilarious scene where the heroes, a rabbit and a fox, rushed to the Department of Motor Vehicles to check out a licence plate, only to get very, very slow service from the sloths manning the counter.

It would appear this stereotyping of civil servants’ work ethic is universal, which is why the parody tickled audiences everywhere.

Now Malaysians have another reason to make fun of their civil servants: they’re too fat. At least the ones in Putrajaya are, according to the 2015 National Health and Morbidity Survey (NHMS) which showed it has the highest rate of overweight and obese citizens.

It’s an established fact that Putrajaya is populated overwhelmingly by government employees, which means those living and serving in the very heart of the nation’s administrative capital are rather unhealthy.

That’s a bummer because, design-wise, Putrajaya got it right. It was a winner in the 75,001­ to 150,000-population category for the Whole City Award under the International Awards for Liveable Communities 2012.

In the paper submitted for the awards, Putrajaya boasted of having “lush greeneries surrounding buildings, infrastructure, (12) parks and gardens.” What’s more, the same paper took into account the need to keep Putra­jaya folks fit and healthy.

It noted that 28% of the residents had a normal BMI (Body Mass Index), 36.3% were overweight, 27.4% obese and 8.3% were even underweight. That was in 2011.

Just four years later, 37% of Putrajayans are said to be overweight and their obesity rate is 43%, according to the NHMS findings.

These are alarming jumps and more so when there were efforts like the Healthy Parks, Healthy People programme to get the residents to exercise to stave off lifestyle diseases like hypertension and diabetes. Among the activities was the Putrajaya Inter-Park Ride monthly cycling event.

So what gives? Why are Putrajayans and Malaysians on the whole so fat? We hold the title of Fatties of South-East Asia; some reports say the whole of Asia.

Some people may, in a perverse way, hail having an overly well-fed population as a sign of a nation’s prosperity. After all, the fattest people in the world are the Americans.

A How’s Life? 2015 Report by the Organisation for Economic Coopera­tion and Development ranked the United States as the nation with the most obese population. It also had the fattest children and the unhealthiest teenagers by a wide margin.

The findings are said to be a blow to the Obama administration and First Lady Michelle Obama because they have been championing this cause for years, including reducing sugar and salt from school lunches.

So if both the US and Malaysian Governments couldn’t stem the fat tide in their respective countries, who can? I would say it’s still the government and we the people.

What we have is a terribly bloated public sector. The Star, quoting Prime Minister’s Office statistics, pointed out that at 1.4 million employees, it’s the largest civil service in South-East Asia.

Supersized and overweight. That’s a double whammy and the kind of Malaysian Book of Records we don’t need. So for a start, how about really downsizing the civil service? After all, why do we need so many civil servants to serve a population that’s way smaller than those in neighbouring countries like Indonesia, the Philippines and Thailand?

Next, I support calls to make it mandatory for civil servants to lose the fat and stay healthy. This is especially so for those who have yet to develop serious illnesses like diabetes. If need be, withhold promotions and salary increases if they don’t meet this KPI.

The reason why I am pushing for this is because civil servants get free medical services in government hospitals and clinics, even after retirement.

That’s a longstanding benefit which I don’t object to, since my retired police officer father is a beneficiary. But with a large, unhealthy government workforce, you can imagine the humongous medical bill we taxpayers are burdened with.

If nothing is done, it will become a bigger burden because, as doctors have warned, 20 years from now, those overweight and obese citizens will be suffering from all sorts of illnesses from stroke, heart disease and kidney failure to diabetes.

All that “will increase the health budget to an unsustainable level,” Malaysian Medical Association president Dr Ashok Zachariah Philip told The Star.

Thanks to my role as the primary caregiver to my elderly parents who suffer from various illnesses, I know how scarily expensive medical care can be for those without access to free treatments.

As a private sector employee, I am grateful to be working for a company that gives me good medical coverage. But I have also bought my own health insurance to prepare for the day when I retire and lose my safety net. In the meantime, I work at staying healthy and medication-free.

As I said, I do not begrudge the medical benefit for government servants. What I do begrudge are those who take it for granted, instead of taking responsibility for their own well-being.

If the Government can work on getting its workforce in shape, non-public sector citizens too can do their part by eating less and more healthily and getting off our butts.

Admittedly, it’s hard now to go out for a run or even a stroll because of the current heat wave and haze. But we can try taking the stairs instead of the lift, drink more water than teh tarik and yes, eat less of our beloved nasi lemak.

Proud as we are that Time magazine ranked it as the ninth healthiest breakfast in the world, we know better. A dish that tastes that good cannot be healthy!

I leave this thought with you: The OEDC report, which measures the personal and economic health of nations, found that the United States indeed topped the chart in personal wealth and even the number of rooms in American homes.

So yes, they have the wealth but where’s the health?


By June H.L. Wong

So Aunty, So What?

Aunty likes this quote by humourist Jarod Kintz: Obesity isn’t as cool as it used to be, back in the earlier centuries. Before it was a reflection on your gross income. Now it’s just gross. Feedback to aunty@thestar.com.my

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