The Housing and Local Government Training Institute is one of the agencies under the Ministry of Housing and Local Government, with a status equivalent to a Department or Division within the Ministry. The establishment of this Institute was approved by the Government in January 2008, with the initial proposal to appoint a Core Team comprising 10 staff members.
Fundamentally, the Institute’s core business is to provide training for Local Authority officers and staff. In the long term, the Institute aims to serve as an information collection centre, a referral centre, and an advisory service provider to Local Authorities. This encompasses fields such as technology, product and service development, policy formulation, as well as the planning and implementation of programmes and projects.
The Institute’s primary clients are all Local Authority employees. Meanwhile, our secondary stakeholders include technical departments directly involved in development within Local Authority jurisdictions, professional organisations (comprising town planners, architects, engineers, landscape architects, and others), non-governmental organisations (NGOs), housing developers, and all bodies involved in the development of human settlements and housing.
The primary objectives for establishing this Institute are to:
- Provide an understanding of current government policies that directly impact the development of human settlements and local governments, such as the National Urbanisation Policy, the National Housing Policy, and the National Solid Waste Management Policy, among others.
- Facilitate a comprehensive understanding of the laws, enforcement methods, acts, and guidelines relevant to Local Authorities, which include:
- Local Government Act 1976 (Act 171).
- Town and Country Planning Act 1976 (Act 172).
- Street, Drainage and Building Act 1974 (Act 133).
- Buildings and Common Property (Maintenance and Management) Act 2007 (Act 663).
- Uniform Building By-Laws 1984.
- Urban, Landscape and Housing Planning Guidelines.