The volume of orders placed by public investors to construction companies in January fell by 51.8 percent year on year to CZK 10.7 billion. The number decreased by 6.3 percent to 268. The largest contracting authority was the Railway Administration with contracts worth CZK 3.3 billion. The value of newly announced orders also fell by 51.8 percent.
The value of contracts awarded for building construction, ie mainly the construction of flats, offices or industrial halls, fell by 47.6 percent year on year to CZK 2.8 billion. The value of orders for civil engineering works, consisting mainly of transport infrastructure, decreased by 51.3 percent to CZK 7.9 billion.
“Despite the relatively high base effect from January 2020, this is a significant slowdown in procurement procedures, which will have a negative impact on the development of construction output in the period. work capacities for the implementation of orders within the contractual deadlines, “said IS construction market analyst Ivan Vrhel. According to him, the reduction of expenditures on the financing of public contracts due to shortfalls of budget revenues of self-governing units may also be a problem.
The share of orders co-financed from European subsidies fell by 29.1 percentage points year-on-year to 24.9 percent.
The value of one contract awarded exceeded CZK 1 billion. It was about electrification and increasing the capacity of the Libina – Uničov railway line for CZK 2 billion. The Railway Administration commissioned it from the Eurovia, OHL ŽS and Elektrizace železnic Praha associations. For the whole of last year, the public administration placed CZK 22 billion contracts.
OHL ŽS won the most orders from the companies, which independently won tenders for CZK 613 million. It will have a share of another CZK 2.58 billion thanks to associations with other companies.
The value of newly announced orders in January fell by 51.8 percent year on year to CZK 11.6 billion. The volume of orders in building construction increased by 36.8 percent year-on-year to CZK 3 billion, in civil engineering it fell by about three-fifths to CZK 8.6 billion.
According to the Czech Statistical Office (CSO), public contracts accounted for 45.9 percent of total sales of construction companies last year. Last year, construction fell by 7.7 percent year on year. Similarly, it last decreased in 2012.
Source CTK and CSO
