It is taking action to ensure that the construction industry is ready and able to deliver greater quantities of warm, dry, affordable homes, said housing minister Megan Woods.
She was speaking during visit to view KiwiBuild houses that are being built at the Petone offsite house-building factory before being shipped up to Maraenui in Napier.
鈥淯nder this government we鈥檙e building the most homes since the 1970s, with a record $13bn of residential construction in the last year, but we need to do even more to tackle the housing shortage. We need to find new ways to get houses built more quickly and off site manufacturing is one of the ways we will do this,鈥� said Woods.
鈥淥ffsite manufacturing has the potential to transform the building sector, and drive innovative ways to build homes at lower cost, and in faster timeframes. It can significantly change the way we build homes because builders won鈥檛 have to contend with external elements like the weather.
鈥淗ousing New Zealand has found that using OSM new builds can be delivered in half the time as conventional building techniques,鈥� said Megan Woods.
The government has been working with offsite manufacturing companies to identify opportunities to work with KiwiBuild to innovate, scale-up, and improve the productivity of New Zealand鈥檚 building and construction capacity, to make quality housing more affordable.
鈥淭he scale of the KiwiBuild programme, especially when aligned with the other arms of the government鈥檚 build programme creates a fantastic opportunity to supercharge the use of offsite manufacturing in New Zealand,鈥� said Woods. 鈥淭he demand these programmes create has the potential for the construction and development industry to make confident investments in their people and new technology. It could play an important role in smoothing out the 鈥榖oom-bust鈥� cycle that has plagued the sector in the past, and help prevent another housing shortage emerging in the future.鈥�
She added: 鈥淭herefore, I expect K膩inga Ora [Homes & Communities] to optimise its operating practices to ensure the entity鈥檚 base demand facilitates the adoption of OSM [offsite manufacturing] and other future innovations 鈥� where they produce more affordable and better housing supply for New Zealanders, and align with wider government goals - such as CarbonZero, skills development, energy efficiency, and regional economic development.鈥�
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