During a Macquarie Group CEO construction conference in Johannesburg, firms in South Africa outlined their restructuring strategies in a bid to cope with the prevailing fall in demand for construction and engineering.
SA construction firms reported declining profits in recent years, mainly as a result of the global financial crisis, especially in global mining commodities and the demand for steel products.
Murray & Roberts announced that it was diversifying to become an international engineering and construction group as part of its 2020 strategic plan.
WBHO said it did not expect major changes in 2016/2017 and that South Africa’s electricity crisis was creating opportunities in the energy sector. They lamented the low mining opportunities in Africa, saying they were re-positioning the civil engineering business away from the mining sector.
Basil Read said that its organisational restructuring into divisions was finished. The move would give it more cost-effective administrative and management structures.
These restructuring plans come only days after their counterparts in Ghana warned of impending massive job cuts in the wake of prohibitively high lending rates by commercial banks.
Ghana real estate developer, Frank Aboagye Danyansah, said high lending rates risk eroding recent gains made in the country, especially in providing affordable housing.
The fall in construction Activities in Ghana and South Africa will directly affect efforts to build more houses in countries having a huge deficit of affordable houses.
