The efforts of government and the private sector to address the challenges of the growing housing need in the Philippines depend largely on the reliability of existing housing statistics combined with having the appropriate framework that will guide the estimation of current and future housing needs. In the paper, an improved housing needs framework is recommended and later on institutionalized by the Housing and Urban Development and Coordinating Council, the country's housing sector authority. The framework does not only focus on housing backlog but on all components of Housing Needs that go into its estimation process and target setting. The concepts for estimating housing needs in the framework are based on principles prescribed by the United Nations. It has two dimensions: (i) construction of housing units; and (ii) housing support and services, to differentiate the “physical” aspect of the housing industry and the “social” aspect of housing to improve the environment for healthy living. The first dimension and main focus of estimation, consists of Accumulated or current needs and Recurrent or future needs, as two main components. Accumulated needs comprise the provision of conventional housing units for households occupying living quarters of an unacceptable type and those doubled-up with other households living in acceptable housing units. Recurrent or future needs, on the other hand, comprise housing needs expected to arise during the Plan period covered by the estimates which include housing units for (a) new households formed, and (b) households whose housing units were lost due to obsolescence, floods, fire, urban renewal/slum clearance, etc, which is estimated using imputed replacement rate. These items were estimated by utilizing data from the 1990 and 2000 Censuses of Population and Housing, and 2007 Population Census. The estimated housing needs from 2007-2010 is 3.6 million households. Paper also provides regional breakdown and improvement of the computation of replacement rate of housing loss.

Keywords: Housing needs; Housing framework; Housing backlog; Replacement rate

Biography: The author is the current Chief of Research and Information Technology Division of Statistical Research and Training Center, the research and training arm of the Philippine Statistical System where she provides overall research supervision, prepare short and long-term plans for statistical research programs and render technical assistance and research-related services. Her expertise has also expanded to other areas as project planning, budgeting and administration, editing of technical papers, proofreading and layouting of journals, writing policy guidelines, and facilitating trainings and workshops. She became a consultant to Asian Development Bank Philippine Headquarter and United Nations Statistical Institute for Asia and the Pacific in reviewing and editing technical publications. She earned her masters degree of Statistics at the University of the Philippines School of Statistics in SY2000. She is a member of Philippine Statistical Association, Inc. and International Statistical Institute Official Statistics Section. She is married for 10 years with three children.