Hyderabad, Dec.24 (Maxim News): CII-IGBC, India’s premier Green Building certification agency signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the Indian Green Building Council (IGBC) to promote green buildings in the country. IGBC & HDFC intend to work together to create awareness and promote financing of green buildings in the country.
Under the MOU, HDFC and IGBC will promote green housing by jointly organising training and awareness programmes to facilitate capacity building across the country.
Amrit Abhijat, Joint Secretary, Ministry of Housing & Urban Affairs said, “It is a unique initiative to promote green buildings which is the need of the hour and I am glad to know that a financial institution like HDFC has devised specific policies to promote green buildings.”
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Speaking on the occasion, S K Hota, Managing Director, National Housing Bank emphasised the need for promoting and popularising green labelled housing amongst the low and middle income segments. He also stressed on making adequate green labelled affordable housing stock available as an option to home buyers in all marketing platforms.
V Suresh, Chairman, IGBC, said “NHB & HDFC service to the nation in supporting development of building habitats of all forms is unparalleled especially in Housing Sector. IGBC is committed to contribute in the sustainable development of built environment in the country. The contribution of Financial Institutions like NHB, HDFC, etc in this green journey has been phenomenal. Today’s formal engagement with HDFC will help advance the National green building movement.”
Speaking on the occasion, Renu Sud Karnad, Managing Director, HDFC Ltd said, “We are witnessing a huge growth in the housing sector with the government’s focus on ’Housing for All by 2022’. With the lowest ever interest rates on home loans, stable property prices and concessions on stamp duty rates by some states, the demand for housing is likely to increase. As the sector is growing rapidly, preserving the environment is of utmost importance. We need more energy efficient, smart, green buildings. This MOU will enable us to promote more financing of green buildings in India. As stakeholders, we all have a role to play in reducing our carbon footprint and safeguarding the environment.”
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Ravi Aggarwal, Cofounder and Group Managing Director – Signature Global, who are developing affordable green projects in Gurgaon (Haryana) said, “All buildings in India should have green components. Developing green buildings in the country is highly recommended as pollution is on the rise here. Encouraging more and more developers to go for green building concept is the need of the hour. The government should incentivize developers by offering 10% additional FAR in return. We are developing 7 IGBC gold rated residential projects at the moment which contribute to the environment in every possible way and promise to offer better lives to its residents.”
K S Venkatagiri, Executive Director, IGBC, said “This formal engagement with HDFC is only a start of a new journey. IGBC & HDFC will be working more closely keeping the sustainability on priority. IGBC will extend all possible support to Team HDFC in promoting sustainable practices”.
As of today, IGBC has over 7.71 Billion sq. ft. of green building footprint with more than 15.5 lacs homes going green, spread across various geographic locations of the country. (Hydnow)