I remember clearly when the National Housing Trust (NHT) was established in 1976; I was in my 20s.

In 1975 the total national budget was roughly J$800 million, and Jamaica had an acute housing shortage.  (When, since Emancipation, when the Freedmen were evicted from their homes on the plantations) has Jamaica not had an acute housing shortage?)

The population was migrating from rural to sub-urban to urban, and the private sector simply was not building fast enough to accommodate the new arrivals.  And because Jamaica’s education system turned out large numbers of illiterate, unskilled labourers, what was needed was low-cost housing.