Financiarul

Romania recorded in Dec. 2009 the highest construction output in the European Union compared to the previous month, under conditions in which the production increased by just 0.5 percent in both the euro area (EU16) and in the EU27, according to data released on Wednesday by the European Statistics Office (Eurostat).

In December 2009 compared to the previous month construction output increased in just two member countries and dropped in 11 member states. Largest advances were recorded only by Romania (±6.9 percent) and Spain (±6.2 percent) and the largest decreases by Slovakia (-11.3 percent), Slovenia (-8.1 percent) and Bulgaria (-7.9 percent).

Annualized construction output showed a decline of 3.3 percent in the European Union and a drop of 3.1 percent in the euro zone. According to available data, construction output declined in ten member states and increased in just three member states.

In this case, the largest annual decreases were recorded by Bulgaria (-33.3 percent), Slovakia (-19.7 percent), Slovenia (-18.8 percent), The Netherlands (-13.8 percent), France (-10.5 percent), Sweden (-9.0 percent), Portugal (-7.58 percent) and Romania (- 7.1 percent) and the largest increases were recorded by Spain (±7.5 percent), Poland (±2.5 percent) and the Czech Republic (±2.3 percent).
According to Romania’s National Statistics Institute data, in December 2009, construction output – gross value increased by 13.1 percent from November 2009, as highlighted by all structure elements.