Production in construction in October down by 0.4% in euro area, decreased by 0.1% in Malta in Q3 2017

Seasonally adjusted production in construction in the euro area in October 2017 went down by 0.4% compared to September of the same year, according to the first estimates from Eurostat, the European Union’s statistical office.

It on average also went down by 0.7% in the ‘EU-28’ group of all member states.

In Malta, production in construction increased by 0.7% in the fourth quarter of 2016, by 2.8% in the first quarter of 2017 and by 7.2% in the second quarter, compared to their respective previous quarters.

It however decreased by 0.1% in the third quarter of this year.

Malta is one of eight member states not required to supply monthly data, with only quarterly and annual data being made available to Eurostat.

Eurostat said that the 0.4% production in construction decrease in the euro area was because of building construction falling by 0.5%, and civil engineering by 0.3%. In the EU-28, construction fell by 0.8%, and civil engineering by 0.1%.

The largest decrease in production in construction, amongst the member states for which monthly data is available, was measured in Sweden (-2.1%), the United Kingdom (-1.6%) and Germany and Romania (-1.3% each).

The largest increase was recorded in Slovenia (+8.5%), Hungary (+5.9%) and Slovakia (+5.7%).

Production in construction was overall 2% higher in both the euro area and the EU-28 in October 2017 when compared to October 2016, with this being explained by the increase in building construction by 1.8% and in civil engineering by 2.9% in October this year as compared to the same month last year.

In October 2017 compared to October 2016, the largest increase in production in construction in member states for which data is available was registered in Hungary (+38.1%), Slovenia (+29.5%) and Poland (+18%).

The largest decrease for the same comparative periods was in Romania (-14.3%) and Spain (-1.2%).