EU, eurozone construction output slumps in December

LONDON (ICIS)–The EU’s petrochemicals-intensive construction sector productivity slumped both month on month and year on year in December, with falls equally pronounced across the building and civil engineering sectors, Eurostat said on Wednesday.

Across the EU’s 27 countries, construction output fell 3.3% compared to November and 2.1% compared with December 2019 as the impact of lockdowns and rising infection rates slowed building activity.

By subsectors, EU building construction – business and residential space – fell 3.3% in December, month on month; civil engineering, composed mostly of public investments in infrastructure, fell 3.1%.

Germany, France, and Slovenia saw the sharpest falls out of member states, reporting contractions of 3.2%, 8.6% and 13.1% respectively.

EUROZONE
In the 19-country currency union within the EU, the eurozone, construction output fell 3.7% month on month and 2.3% year on year.

The construction industry is a key end market for petrochemicals.

“The annual average production [index] in construction for the year 2020, compared with 2019, fell by 5.7% in the eurozone and by 5.0% in the EU,” said Eurostat (see graph).

The accumulated losses in both areas