Beijing, Feb 24 (IANS): China will build 6 million new homes for residents of shanty towns before the end of 2017.

This was announced by Minister of Housing and Urban-Rural Development Chen Zhenggao on Thursday, People's Daily reported. 

The Chinese central government started a three-year project to rebuild urban shanty towns in 2015, aiming to construct a total of 18 million new homes in all. In 2015, construction began on 6.01 million new dwellings, and work on another 6.06 million was started in 2016.

According to Chen, the Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development (MHURD) kicked off this year's shanty town transformation work on January 16. 

The central government has provided 224.3 billion yuan in subsidies for the work in 2017, an increase of 15 billion yuan compared with last year.

China is determined to reconstruct all of its existing shanty towns by 2020. The ministry is working with relevant departments to conduct a thorough investigation and make the planned transformation a reality.