Construction work recorded a slight decrease of 1% in March over the same month last year, affected by declines in infrastructure and non-residential construction, whereas housing construction continued to increase significantly, according to the National Statistics Institute (INS).

March was the third month of decline in 2017, after a 1.1% decline in January and 3.4% in February. In total, the construction sector decreased by 1.5% in the first quarter of 2017 over the same period last year.

In March, infrastructure work saw the most significant decline, but housing construction increased substantially. Infrastructure work went down by 20.3% year-on-year in March whereas the non-residential construction recorded an annual drop of 1.1%. Meanwhile housing construction increased by 64.1% year-on-year.

Construction work decreased by 4.8% in 2016 compared to the previous year, after an advance of 10.4% in 2015.

editor@romania-insider.com