MANILA, Philippines — The Philippines construction industry proved upbeat on its prospects despite headwinds that continue to roil their sector amid the pandemic, so says a report from a construction management software company.
The How We Build Now report, penned by Procore and independent research company YouGov found that expectations for growth within the next 12 months across the local construction industry stayed in the green.
Related Stories
The survey polled 1,644 across Asia and the Pacific, particularly in Australia, Malaysia, New Zealand and the Philippines.
Data provided by Procore Technologies, Inc. showed 80% of business leaders within the sector project the number of projects they’ll take on will increase this year.
Likewise, optimism across decision-makers soared as 83% of respondents are expecting the value of projects to trend upward in 2023.
The local construction industry is still dealing with the effects of the pandemic in 2023. Costs across the sector remain to be a headache, as supply chain bottlenecks fanned inflation woes.
Fumin Rianto, associate director at YouGov, said that these challenges across the construction industry in Southeast Asia compelled leaders to go local. “More are looking at local supply as opposed to more global supply chains,” he told journalists on Tuesday.
Procore’s survey of business bigwigs within the sector, including 303 of them hailing from the Philippines, asserted that costs “keep leaders up at night.”
The survey revealed 46% of those polled in the Philippines said they are dealing with the increasing costs of raw materials and equipment over the next 12 months.
On the other hand, 35% found it challenging to score competitive bids at sustainable margins.
The findings come at an inflection point for the sector, where tech adoption could score them revenues and gains in efficiency but some business leaders exercise caution as challenges remain.
Rianto spotlighted the case in Asia’s construction industry, where businesses prefer to employ tech for their operations that were already proven, as 40% of respondents expressed some caution.
“There’s tendency on the backfoot to follow the leader, as they adopt to a wait-and-see approach,” he added. — Ramon Royandoyan