Private construction projects’ value down 6.8%

The value of the country’s private construction projects went down 6.8 percent in the first quarter compared to last year’s, even as the number of projects rose 4.4 percent in the same period, the National Statistics Office (NSO) reported yesterday.

Preliminary results of the NSO’s private construction statistics showed that the total value of private construction projects for the first quarter reached P49.2 billion this year, down from the P52.8 billion recorded a year earlier.

The value of residential construction, it said, declined by 17.5 percent to P23.3 billion this year from the P28.2 billion a year ago.

The value of non-residential construction meanwhile, climbed 2.3 percent to P19.8 billion this year from the same period last year.

Alterations and repairs of existing structures, likewise grew by 17 percent to P6 billion this year from the comparable period last year.

But while the value of private construction projects fell in the first quarter, the NSO noted that the number of private construction projects with approved building permits for the same period reached 29,585, higher than last year’s 28,347.

“An increase in applications over the same period of last year was observed for both residential and non-residential constructions,” the NSO noted.

It said that residential construction projects went up 3.1 percent to 21,424 this year compared to a year ago, while nonresidential construction projects rose 16.9 percent to 4,085 this year compared to a year ago.

The NSO also said that combined approved building permits for additions, alteration and repairs of existing structures was up slightly at 4,076 this year from the previous year’s 4,068.

Most of the private construction projects were located in Calabarzon (Cavite-laguna-Batangas- Rizal- Quezon) which had 6,362 projects or 21.5 percent of the total.

University of the Philippines economist Benjamin Diokno said in an e-mail message yesterday that the increase in residential construction projects in the first quarter of this year suggests a reversal of the trend in the number of approved permits for such projects which has been falling after a weak recovery in the first quarter of 2011.