To keep up with fast population growth, Atlantic and federal housing ministers are looking at factory-built housing for the region.

They had a meeting in Halifax on Monday to discuss the issue.

Their plan would be a catalogue of pre-approved designs that would be tailored to our climate and building codes with available materials that are in the region.

They would be a more modern version, but similar to homes built after the Second World War, including a modular style.

“In rural Atlantic Canada … there isn’t really a lot of infrastructure to build homes. We saw that when had the fires in Shelburne when we were looking at who was going to rebuild there … where are the construction workers? So, we know that modular will be a solution for that,” Nova Scotia Housing Minister John Lohr said.

Lohr added that modular homes could also be used for apartments.

New Brunswick Housing Minister Jill Green said the province has a healthy modular construction sector.

“It may not be as strong as some of the other Atlantic provinces, but we all want to use modular construction as a solution, as a piece of the solution for the housing crisis,” said Green.

‘Working with the entities that deliver those modular homes to have agreed-upon designs for all Atlantic provinces means that we can all use the same designs and all the modular contractors can bid on the same projects and be on level playing fields.”

Meanwhile, Lohr said although we need housing now, he would like to see results by mid to late summer.

The ministers will have another meeting in April in Ottawa to continue to discuss the matter.