China will create 2 million units of public rental housing in 2017 to provide affordable housing for low-income people, said a senior official.
Accelerating the construction and allocation of public rental housing is high on the agenda of the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development (MOHURD), said Vice Minister Lu Kehua.
China sees public rental housing as a way of providing homes for families who have been priced out of the property market and has invested billions of yuan.
In recent years China has increased subsidies and credit support for such housing, and, by the end of 2016, a total of 11.3 million families had been homed.
Lu, speaking to Xinhua in an interview, said that his ministry will work with the national economic planning body and the ministry of finance to increase support for the program.
Under China's the system, low-income families can also rent apartments themselves and receive government subsides.
Lu asked local governments in some regions to lower the threshold for the public housing system and give migrant workers access. Most regions had already done so.
